The Russian Grandmaster David Bronstein came breathtakingly close to becoming World Champion and made vital contributions to the theory and literature of the game. Chess is rife with the word genius, but Bronstein's games blazed with that elusive quality.
As well as his legacy of beautiful games, Bronstein will be remembered for his books & innovations in the opening. In the1950s he and Boleslavsky infused the King's Indian defence with a variety of dynamic, new ideas, and through there games and analysis forged it into a respected modern opening system.
The above is (press clipping) from the U.K. Times obituary.
Bronstein v Botvinnik, 22nd match game, World Championship, 1951 Dutch Defence.
11:... g5
23:.. Bd7
32: g4
37: Bg3
Simply can't get my head round pgn but if your interested, sure you'll find it. A classic, balls of steal🚬
David Bronstein, chess grandmaster & author 1924 - 2006
Bronstein vs Korchnoi, 1962.
Watch for White's bombshell final move. Then try to figure out the continuation.
The solution:
The post that was quoted here has been removedHe distanced himself from the oppressive aspects of the Soviet Union for example, when in 1976 Victor Korchnoi defected to Switzerland, Bronstein refused to sign a letter of condemnation which was circulated among top Soviet players. A good guy in my book🚬
@Hells-Caretaker
His book of the tournament at Zurich 1953 is said to be one of the greatest books on chess ever published.
@Duchess64
In his match against Botvinnik, it seems Botvinnik was simply the better endgame player.
Certainly a complicated character and more and more comes to light
every passing year. I know people who met him and played him.
He played in weekend opens in the U.K. and even played in a few club
league matches. Apparently a top notch bloke.
I wrote a tribute/obituary to David Bronstein on a 'posh' site.
The readers would have been mainly non-chess players so I
mentioned a few well known things, James Bond etc..etc.
I see someone has found a few holes 10 years later.
(Botvinnik was a jew and I'm sure I mentioned that somewhere but
perhaps or fell foul of the editors scissors. Some of it was trimmed.)
Someone else mentioned why I do not mention Bronstein's 200 Games.
That is a book, one day I like, another day I dislike. Must have been a dislike day.
http://textualities.net/geoff-chandler/grand-master
@moonbus saidI don't want to rain on the parade here, but have never understood why that book on the Zurich candidates tournament of 1953 is on so many top ten lists. I played over a number of games in that book, and they're fine quality games of course, but doubt they are of higher quality than your typical Informant, or other candidates matches. So, what makes this such a "great" book?
@Hells-Caretaker
His book of the tournament at Zurich 1953 is said to be one of the greatest books on chess ever published.
@mchill
Presumably Bronstein's commentary on the games is what is worth the price of admission. Admittedly, I have not seen the book myself; I'm going by what others, who must have seen the book, have said about it.
Want to sell/trade your copy?
It is the unique 'food for thought' insights Bronstein makes.
For example Look at the in depth comments after move 30 in game 96 (Averbakh - Kotov).
He is not analysing the game, he give a wee speech on intuition and imagination in chess.
Telling the reader, and he aimed it at low level readers (us) that combinations are not
always calculated to the end but guided by intuition. So don't despair if find you cannot
work it all out OTB, if your intuition tells you to go for it....go for it and yes marvel at the
games containing beauty and depth but don't always think the master player saw it all.
If you see the bare score of this game, you go wow!
But Bronstein's piece (too long to show here) throws some light on how it was done
and as if to make a point Bronstein later reveals that Kotov repeated a few moves to
get to move 40, then adjourn and work out the win adding Kotov would have known
from move 30 that the glorious win was in there but he had not (yet) seen it.
And that is just one game. Usually if you get just one thing from a book that will hold
you in good stead then it's job done. Bronstein drops these wee pearls all over the pages.
(Boris Vainshtein did the spade work, gathering the games dropping
in some of the variations, Bronstein did the reveal all comments.)
@greenpawn34
Thanks GP. I learn little or nothing from annotations which reel off variations which end with "and white stands better". I want to think through the thought processes of the player(s). As Tartakower once said, the moves are all there, but you have see them. I want to know how GM Bronstein came to see that blockbuster last move in the Korchnoi game, for example. That rook move would never have occurred to me (and obviously it took Korchnoi by surprise too). Once it has been pointed out to me, I can see why it works; but how did Bronstein conceive of such a daring move?? Korchnoi's hanging queen, the advanced knight pawn, the queen checks, the multiple flight squares of Korchnoi's king . . . these are all pieces of a puzzle, and to have seen the rook move when his own king was threatened with mate on the move is magnificent! Most players would have been concentrating on trying to avert the mate threat.
@moonbus saidSorry, I sold mine a few years back.
@mchill
Presumably Bronstein's commentary on the games is what is worth the price of admission. Admittedly, I have not seen the book myself; I'm going by what others, who must have seen the book, have said about it.
Want to sell/trade your copy?