Chess to Enjoy / Entertainment
Instructional? Maybe Not.
The disappearing teachable moment. By GM ANDY SOLTIS
LET ME TRY TO SAY SOMETHING NEW this month about the most commented-upon game in chess history. You must have seen it. Novices who have played
over only one master game in their life have looked at this one.
PHILIDOR’S DEFENSE (C41) Paul Morphy
Duke of Brunswick and Count Lousard Paris, 1858
1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 d6 3. d4 Bg4? 4. dxe5 Bxf3 5. Qxf3 dxe5 6. Bc4 Nf6 7. Qb3! Qe7
However, when a novice plays over this game
today it may be with a computer. A machine will strongly prefer 8. Bxf7+! . After 8. ... Qxf7 9. Qxb7 there is no …Qb4+. A computer will also point out what happens
if Black plays à la Morphy, 9. ... Bc5 10. Qc8+ Ke7 11. Qxh8 Bxf2+!. It will show the dazzling line 12. Kxf2 Nxe4+
13. Ke1 Qf2+ 14. Kd1 Qxg2 15. Bg5+! Kf7! 16. Re1 Qg4+ 17. Kc1 Qxg5+ 18. Kd1 Qg4+ 19. Kc1 Qf4+! 20. Kd1 Nf2+ 21. Ke2 Nc6! 22. Qxa8 Nd4+ and mate in three. But the spoilsport machine will also add that
instead of 12. Kxf2??, White wins easily with 12. Ke2!. What conclusion can a novice draw from this?
The inconvenient truth is that Morphy was rewarded for playing a second- best move, 8. Nc3?. His greatest game should never have happened. The proper finish was 8. Bxf7+!, Black resigns. This kind of thing is a growing problem for
members of the chess-book writing guild. We are discovering that many of the best-known instruc- tional examples are flawed.
The reason this game has been reprinted in
dozens of books is that it is so instructional. It superbly illustrates must-know themes such as sacrifice, rapid development, the initiative, double attack, pins, the power of two bishops, and the benefits of connecting of rooks.
There’s a whole textbook in its 17 moves:
8. Nc3 c6 9. Bg5 b5 10. Nxb5 cxb5 11. Bxb5+ Nbd7 12. 0-0-0 Rd8 13. Rxd7 Rxd7 14. Rd1 Qe6 15. Bxd7+ Nxd7 16. Qb8+ Nxb8 17. Rd8 mate
But take a fresh look at the diagram: White’s
7. Qb3 threatened both 8. Qxb7 and 8. Bxf7+. Annotators traditionally point out that 7. ... Qe7 stops one threat and allows Black to escape into a pawn-down endgame after 8. Qxb7? Qb4+!. White deserves more than that from such a strong position, they say. That’s why 8. Nc3 is usually given an exclamation point.
16 October 2015 | Chess Life
FOUR KNIGHTS GAME (C49) William Winter Jose Capablanca Hastings, 1919
1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Nc3 Nf6 4. Bb5 Bb4 5. 0-0 0-0 6. Bxc6 dxc6 7. d3 Bd6 8. Bg5 h6 9. Bh4 c5 10. Nd5 g5 11. Nxf6+ Qxf6 12. Bg3 Bg4 13. h3 Bxf3 14. Qxf3 Qxf3 15. gxf3 f6 16. Kg2 a5 17. a4 Kf7
This game has been used many times to
illustrate how to turn an enemy bishop into a sort of big pawn. White resigned after 18. Rh1 Ke6 19. h4 Rfb8 20. hxg5 hxg5 21. b3 c6 22. Ra2 b5 23. Rha1 c4 24. axb5 cxb3 25. cxb3 Rxb5 26. Ra4 Rxb3 27. d4 Rb5 28. Rc4 Rb4 29. Rxc6 Rxd4. But as Garry Kasparov discovered, White can
create an impregnable fortress on light squares beginning with 18. c4!. For example, 18. ... c6 19. Rfc1 Rfb8 20. b3 b5 21. Rc3. The black rooks cannot penetrate (21. ...
Rb6 22. Kf1 bxc4 23. dxc4! Rab8 24. Ra3), as Kasparov showed in his first Great Predecessors book. Of course, finding flaws in published analysis
is not new. But computers have just made it much easier.
SICILIAN DEFENSE,
WING GAMBIT DECLINED (B20) Frank Marshall Hyman Rogosin New York, 1940
1. e4 c5 2. b4 cxb4 3. a3 Nc6?! 4. axb4 Nf6 5. b5 Nd4 6 c3 Ne6 7. e5 Nd5 8. c4 Ndf4 9. g3 Ng6 10. f4
This game is sometimes given with “10. ...
resigns.” Black didn’t actually concede for another 16 moves, which began with 10. ... Ngxf4 11. gxf4 Nxf4 12. d4 Ng6 13. h4. My fellow co-conspirators in the chessbook-
writing racket regularly recycle this game to illustrate the powers of pawns. But amateurs discovered long ago that Black can avoid material loss with 10. ... Nd4, and thanks to computers they now know that the position is actually very unclear after 11. Bb2 Nf5. You would think that book-writing should be
easier today than ever before. After all, there are so many more games played by masters nowadays. We can just replace the Morphy, Capa and Marshall games with modern, computer-vetted ones, right? Well, no. Games that a computer finds relatively faultless
usually offer little instructional value. For example, this is being hailed as one of the most impressive wins of 2015:
FOUR KNIGHTS GAME, RUBINSTEIN VARIATION (C48) GM Yi Wei (FIDE 2703, CHN) GM Maxim Rodshtein (FIDE 2667, ISR) World Team Ch. 2015, Tsakhkadsor, Armenia, 04.25.2015
1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bb5 Nf6 4. Nc3 Nd4 5. Ba4 c6 6. Nxe5 d5 7. d3 Bd6 8. f4 Bc5
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