Originally posted by petrovitchNOOOO ! don't listen to him, he's an evil creature trying to get you disgusted by endings!! 🙂
Technique for the Tournament Player by Dvoretsky
Practical Rook Endings by Korchnoi
Those 2 books are really great, but for players with already good ending knowledge, who want to go further and understand strategic ideas in the endgame.
In my opinion they are perfect for 2300+ players (though courageous 1900+ players can enjoy them too)
Kortchnoi's book especially is full of long analysis, deep and subtle chess.
When all he has to know for now is something like 50 classical endgame positions (lucena, philidor, draw position with pawn vs Q, etc...)
Dvoretsky's endgame manual is a much better choice, one of the only books by dvoretsky not aimed at master level players !
But it's quite a big book, and if you're lazy (like most of us), i think the best choice might be Averbakh's chess endings, essential knowledge
Small book with all you need to know (i don't think you need much more knowledge than that up to 2200 elo... which doesn't mean getting more won't help!)
Silman's latest book is a good choice too. Petrovitch i think you were thinking of another of silman's books (reassess your chess) where the endings are a bit too light. In his last book which is only about endgames, he goes all the way from beginner to master (2400 elo) level
Originally posted by petrovitchI haven't found anything of significance in English. The only thing I could find on the internet was an ebook that appears to be in Russian. It doesn't do me any good; Do you read Russian?
Does anyone know where I can find a compilation of Grigoriev's work? I've seen reference to books long out of print. How about pgn files? I've only found a dozen or so of his problems and I've read about more than 200 compositions.
Originally posted by KrezayDon't let the text in this book put you off, I find it easily readable.
Thanks for your replies!
So I went on amazon.com and searched Dvoretsky Endgame Manual which I've heard is a great book but the print seems horrible... faded blue lol.
This was my #1 choice but I HIGHLY doubt I would find it comfortable reading such crap text.
I do think that the book is pretty heavy going but that's the trade-off with it containing so much useful information and excersises.
In fact, although I'm very pleased with it I'm looking at getting Silman as something to read first to give me some basics before I delve back into the Dvoretsky.
Mad Rook, I don't read russion no lol.
JonnyT, you seem like a great player... yet you feel you aren't yet ready for Dvorsky? Would you recommend I buy Silmans Complete Endgame Manual myself also before I go into Dvorsky?
I am considering this, but I just hope silman has a lot which I don't yet understand all that great.
Thanks again everyone.
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Originally posted by KrezayWell, petrovitch was the one asking about Gregoriev games, so the information was mostly for him. But I'm glad you found it humorous, lol.
Mad Rook, I don't read russion no lol.
I did find some web information that discusses the Russian notation for the chess pieces, so if nothing else, a person could follow the moves and annotation symbols like ? and !. Of course, that still leaves the problem of not being able to understand the text.
Amazingly, I actually went to a couple of websites describing the Russian alphabet and simple "learning Russian" stuff. I can't believe that I even momentarily considered learning Russian. Temporary insanity is my only defense, I'm afraid. (I also considered getting a copy of Hanon Russell's book, "Russian for Chessplayers", but I think I've even given up on that idea.)
Edit - BTW, I think the book I found was Kan and Bondarevsky's compilation of Grigoriev's work, although I'm not even absolutely sure of that.
Originally posted by KrezayI'm far from great, about average for this site. The Dvoretsky Manual is a great book and contains 500 dense pages of well-explained endgame rules, plans and theories, as well as lots of excercises.
JonnyT, you seem like a great player... yet you feel you aren't yet ready for Dvorsky? Would you recommend I buy Silmans Complete Endgame Manual myself also before I go into Dvorsky?
I am considering this, but I just hope silman has a lot which I don't yet understand all that great.
Thanks again everyone.
If you were to go through the book and retain all the information in it, you would have the endgame knowledge of an IM. The problem is that this would take hundreds, if not thousands of hours of dedicated study.
I don't have that kind of time so am looking for something that will lead me through the basics first, getting more advanced as I go on.
The Dvoretsky orders it's chapters by position (eg 50 pages of various KvK+P, then another 50 of KvK+N+P etc), so that after my first 10 hours of the book, I still haven't seen anything involving anything other than pawns. I suppose I could skip through the various chapters and only read the first few pages of each but to be honest, I'm too lazy and would rather spend $20 on a book that will do that for me. During and after reading the Silman, I will be able to refer to the Dvoretsky for deeper analysis, so I don't see it as a waste of time me getting it.
Hope this helps.