Originally posted by tomtom232
I figure I have the determination to get through it. The edition I ordered has blue print for the most important parts. Anyway, Silman's book and all the other ones will continue to be there for a while.
The reviews seem to be varied, hard to draw a conclusion on its usefulness to the average Joe from my perspective. From Silman's site:
Reviewed by John Donaldson
A few years ago Grandmaster Alex Shabalov was giving a lecture at the Mechanics' Institute Chess Club in San Francisco. When he finished his talk, Shabalov opened the floor to questions and the first was "What book do you recommend for someone who is ambitious to improve?" Shabalov said that normally this would be a hard question to answer without more information about the questioner's strengths and weaknesses, their age, how long they had been playing, how much time they had to study, etc, but that a recent book had made this all a moot point. The several time U.S. Champion recommended DVORETSKY'S ENDGAME MANUAL as that rare book that players of many different abilities could benefit from.
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Highly Recommended
Reviewed by Jeremy Silman
There is no doubt that this is a great book, but who is it for? This is always the million-dollar question, and in this case I can say, “For everyone 1400 and up!” – with one caveat: If you intend to make a serious, intense, and prolonged study of the endgame, then this is the only book you'll need. However, if you only want to learn the basics, preferring to spend most of your time on openings, middlegames, tactics and whatnot, then DVORETSKY'S ENDGAME MANUAL might prove a bit overwhelming.
Reviewed by John Watson
DVORETSKY’S ENDGAME MANUAL is quite simply a masterpiece of research and insight. It is a tremendous contribution to endgame literature, certainly the most important one in many years, and destined to be a classic of the literature (if it isn’t already one). The famous trainer Mark Dvoretsky has put together a vast number of examples that he has not only collected, but analyzed and tested with some of the world’s strongest players. This is a particularly important book from the standpoint of clarifying, correcting, and extending the theory of endings. Most of all, Dvoretsky’s analysis is staggering in its depth and accuracy.
However, before discussing the specifics of DVORETSKY’S ENDGAME MANUAL [henceforth “DEM”], a word of warning is in order. I must emphasize that this is a terribly advanced work that I don’t think is a very good way for the average player to study the endgame. The majority of the examples are complex and position-specific, and neither the average student nor even strong masters will follow or play over most of the hundreds of positions that are given extensive analysis, not to mention the subvariations derived from those positions. Even when introducing “the basics”, Dvoretsky’s approach is often more complex than is necessary for an average student, and in any case such a thick book will seldom be used for the sake of elementary instruction. The majority of the other material is frankly very difficult. So take note: I don’t want to be blamed, in praising this book, for your purchasing something that you find intimidating, relatively dull, or otherwise unsatisfying. That said, if you are up to a real challenge and have a great deal of time to devote to reading and playing over examples you will inevitably derive great value from this work.
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You can see the incredible detail that Dvoretsky goes into and his continual search for truth that leads to new or amended conclusions. This is an ultra-high-quality book. But is most of this particularly valuable for players up to 2200, or even 2400? Sure, a thorough study of each example would definitely improve one’s understanding, but that’s true for any complex position from any book. Perhaps the most accurate conclusion is that the stronger you are the more you will get from DEM. In my own teaching to average players I am still using Mueller and Lamprecht’s FUNDAMENTAL CHESS ENDINGS, which has a wonderful balance between Encyclopaedic coverage (I can find almost anything), examples that can be shortened at most points, and clear explanations that bring together endings of the same sort. To me it provides a simpler method for giving students both information and a sense of why they are proceeding as they are. In either case, it seems to me, a teacher’s guidance is preferable, but lacking it I would like to see students learning the fundamentals in a systematic and comprehensible way.
Endgame books
05 Jun '11 11:01
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