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When we were playing chess in our teens we thought of Lasker as the psychologist, Capablanca as the natural talent and Alekhine as the irresistible force. On Olympus with those three we placed a fourth, Nimzowitsch.
I think this was because Reinfeld’s Nimzovich the Hypermodern was easily available as a Dover paperback. The first three were of the classic period but Nimzowitsch was the player of the future. A modern player with a plan, a player to be emulated. He wrote about the “mysterious rook move” and my regular opponent at weekly matches, deeply imbued with the Nimzowitsch mystique, would deem all of his own rook moves in our games as mysterious. The Nimzo-Indian became our favorite defence. I bought My System and wished that The Blockade and Chess Praxis were available but, in our bookstores and libraries, they were not.
Later, as a collector, I learned of his two tournament books, Bad Kissingen 1928 and Karlsbad 1929, and bought them.
Recently, I was looking over a German chess book auction and found up for bid this work which translates into English as How I Became (a) Grandmaster:
Nimzowitsch, A. I., Wie ich Großmeister wurde
Erstmalige Übersetzung aus dem Russischen von Rolf H. Voland. Leipzig 2009
It appears to be one of those limited edition works, which you can pay an arm and a leg for – if you can find a vendor. The original is Kak ya stal grosmeysterom (Leningrad 1929).
From some published extracts I learned that N. was very disheartened by his failure at Barmen 1905. This he attributed to lack of knowledge of the openings and positional play.
When the Nuremberg (1906) tournament games collection came out with Tarrasch's notes he took the book to the bookbinder’s asking him to bind in blank leaves between each two leaves of the text. Then he began to analyse some of the games, mostly the ones played by Salwe, Duras and Forgacs, and M. Chigorin's ones as Black. He entered the found results on the intervening leaves right away. He always "played" for one of the partners only - either as White, or as Black, trying first to find the best move on his own and then looking up the move made in the game. So, a "game" lasted at least about 6 hours.
Well, I had to get a copy of How I Became Grandmaster but could only find a reprinted copy in Russian through Barnes and Noble from Sam Sloan’s Ishi Press.
That publisher has a catalogue of some 170 chess books, the rights of which you would think still belong to other publishers. These include My 60 Memorable Games (Fischer), Chess Archives (Euwe), The Fireside Book of Chess (Chernev), Fischer vs Spassky (Gligorich) and Pal Benko’s Endgame Laboratory. The only other publisher with such a catalogue is Hardinge Simpole. One assumption is that the copyrights to these books have not been renewed by their owners. Another is that the owners have been handsomely reimbursed by the new publishers – a thought so beautiful that it brings tears to my eyes! New in Chess is now selling some Ishi Press volumes.
In any case, the Ishi reprint has 64 pages, is entirely in Russian, has 27 pages of introduction and 13 games. The introduction has, among other things, a description of how he learned chess at eight years of age, his further development, his arch rival Tarrasch, the description above of his use of the Nuremberg tourney book and an encounter with Tarrasch at Ostende 1907.
This completes my collection of books that Nimzowitsch authored.
While I was at it, I got Lasker’s Struggle and Alekhine’s My Struggle. It is quite a struggle to find these from the usual dealers.
References:
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/ishi-press-chess
http://www.hardingesimpole.co.uk/ser...s_classics.htm
I think this was because Reinfeld’s Nimzovich the Hypermodern was easily available as a Dover paperback. The first three were of the classic period but Nimzowitsch was the player of the future. A modern player with a plan, a player to be emulated. He wrote about the “mysterious rook move” and my regular opponent at weekly matches, deeply imbued with the Nimzowitsch mystique, would deem all of his own rook moves in our games as mysterious. The Nimzo-Indian became our favorite defence. I bought My System and wished that The Blockade and Chess Praxis were available but, in our bookstores and libraries, they were not.
Later, as a collector, I learned of his two tournament books, Bad Kissingen 1928 and Karlsbad 1929, and bought them.
Recently, I was looking over a German chess book auction and found up for bid this work which translates into English as How I Became (a) Grandmaster:
Nimzowitsch, A. I., Wie ich Großmeister wurde
Erstmalige Übersetzung aus dem Russischen von Rolf H. Voland. Leipzig 2009
It appears to be one of those limited edition works, which you can pay an arm and a leg for – if you can find a vendor. The original is Kak ya stal grosmeysterom (Leningrad 1929).
From some published extracts I learned that N. was very disheartened by his failure at Barmen 1905. This he attributed to lack of knowledge of the openings and positional play.
When the Nuremberg (1906) tournament games collection came out with Tarrasch's notes he took the book to the bookbinder’s asking him to bind in blank leaves between each two leaves of the text. Then he began to analyse some of the games, mostly the ones played by Salwe, Duras and Forgacs, and M. Chigorin's ones as Black. He entered the found results on the intervening leaves right away. He always "played" for one of the partners only - either as White, or as Black, trying first to find the best move on his own and then looking up the move made in the game. So, a "game" lasted at least about 6 hours.
Well, I had to get a copy of How I Became Grandmaster but could only find a reprinted copy in Russian through Barnes and Noble from Sam Sloan’s Ishi Press.
That publisher has a catalogue of some 170 chess books, the rights of which you would think still belong to other publishers. These include My 60 Memorable Games (Fischer), Chess Archives (Euwe), The Fireside Book of Chess (Chernev), Fischer vs Spassky (Gligorich) and Pal Benko’s Endgame Laboratory. The only other publisher with such a catalogue is Hardinge Simpole. One assumption is that the copyrights to these books have not been renewed by their owners. Another is that the owners have been handsomely reimbursed by the new publishers – a thought so beautiful that it brings tears to my eyes! New in Chess is now selling some Ishi Press volumes.
In any case, the Ishi reprint has 64 pages, is entirely in Russian, has 27 pages of introduction and 13 games. The introduction has, among other things, a description of how he learned chess at eight years of age, his further development, his arch rival Tarrasch, the description above of his use of the Nuremberg tourney book and an encounter with Tarrasch at Ostende 1907.
This completes my collection of books that Nimzowitsch authored.
While I was at it, I got Lasker’s Struggle and Alekhine’s My Struggle. It is quite a struggle to find these from the usual dealers.
References:
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/ishi-press-chess
http://www.hardingesimpole.co.uk/ser...s_classics.htm
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