The World Championship in the Court of Public Opinion

Everyone else is talking about Magnus Carlsen's sudden exit from the current World Championship cycle, so why shouldn't I? Yesterday, I listed a number of similar episodes on my World Chess Championship Blog (see Carlsen Quits) and a few years ago I detailed the circumstances around GM Carlsen's first exit (stage right; see Groan Prix, same blog). His latest exit was more stage left -- he's gone but far from forgotten.

In Magnus Carlsen drops out of World Championship cycle, Chessbase.com published Carlsen's letter to 'FIDE President Kirsan Ilyumzhinov & FIDE World Championship Committee'. His reasons are clear enough, if not completely consistent. At the end of that page are links to previous Chessbase articles on the 2011 candidates. The organization of the event has exposed FIDE to one of its most incompetent series of actions in recent memory (a lot to choose from there), of which someone has been keeping track on Wikipedia: World Chess Championship 2012.

For me, the most interesting aspect of Carlsen quitting has been the discussion it generated on the leading news blogs. The most informed commentators are generally found on the Daily Dirt (Chessninja.com) and, although the rhythm of new posts has tapered off dramatically over the past few months, the Carlsen episode was worthy of a new post.

• Carlsen Bails from WCh Cycle (see also Tal Memorial 2010, which has a healthy number of Carlsen-centric comments)

A relative newcomer to the chess discussion blogs is Chessvibes.com. Lately it has been filling the commentary void left by Chessninja's frequent, lengthy absences.

• Magnus Carlsen steps out of World Championship cycle
  
• Carlsen’s withdrawal: reactions from candidates and readers
  
• The Carlsen team clarifies

As a keen observer of the World Championship, I'm interested in any informed discussion of the subject. There are dozens of knowledgeable chess fans making comments on these two blogs, covering the complete range of opinion, speculation, and historical fact. An example of opinion would be the ideal structure for a World Championship cycle; of speculation, the *real* motives behind Carlsen's announcement; and of fact, the chronological sequence of other events in the current and preceding cycles (which ended with Anand's win over Topalov a few months ago).

There's a lot to digest there, and after the dust has settled, I might attempt a summary. Those comments represent, after all, the court of public opinion in full session.

More Watson on Huebner

In Using Computers to Call into Question, I quoted a John Watson review of 'World Champion Fischer' by Robert Huebner (2003): 'The core of the CD is Robert Huebner's analysis of Fischer's play, which parallels that of Alekhine in his CD that I previously criticised.' Curious about Watson's review of Huebner's previous work, I found Book Reviews by John Watson : #42, subtitled, 'Chess CDs: Coming of Age?'.

ChessBase continues to be the leader in CD chess products. Here I look briefly at 5 new examples, 3 of which I like very much, one which depends entirely upon the audience, and one which has some redeeming features, but its most important segment is in my opinion a 'pile of crap' (with a nod towards Tony Miles).

This last is Robert Huebner's 'World Champion Alekhine'. The redeeming features have to do with its biographical and historical essays. These can be informative; the one that struck me as truly unique was a review of Alekhine's tournaments, including crosstables. The photographs in this section were the real treat; they are numerous and span his career, including looks at many well-known opponents.

Unfortunately, the CD features an 'analysis' of Alekhine's play and of his writings. All you have to do is read the 'Table of Contents' (a sort of summary of 23 Alekhine games) to see how harshly and negatively Huebner assesses both. For the record, I also looked carefully at several of the heavily-annotated games, which are in the same unimaginative spirit but more boring.

Anyway, in Huebner's view of the world, Alekhine had terrible weaknesses in every single aspect of the game, including technical and psychological ones. Here's his entire summary of Alekhine's play and annotation in Game#2: 'Ruining the pawn structure - materialism; underestimating the active counterplay of the opponent - strategic deficiencies in the opening; bad positional judgment - defensive possibilities of the opponent are not exhaustively scrutinized - lack of criticism towards the own conduct of the attack.' [...]

Then we have the usual Huebner analysis that drives everyone away from his work: it seems that he's always buried in some detail so many moves and subvariations away from the original game that Kasparov himself might have trouble remembering where he was; and remarkably, the simple moves are often neglected. I'm sure that Huebner gets some sort of personal satisfaction from using untold hours (and presumably his computer) to denigrate Alekhine's play. To me, however, all this huffing and puffing reeks of snobbery and narrow-mindedness. Perhaps if it weren't so easy to do this kind of analysis and criticism, I might at least admire the 'scholarly' aspects of this work. But I'm sure that I could write the same boring critique of Huebner's own games and character (duplicating the tone would be difficult) if I wouldn't feel cheap by doing so.

To conclude, someone else may find this a brilliant, objective criticism of a World Champion's play. I myself think that Huebner's work in 'World Champion Alekhine' is unimaginative and narrow-minded. Those interested in photographs and historical information might want to give it a try.

Ouch! Although the review isn't dated, the list of titles at the top of the review shows that they were all published in 2001. Has Chessbase dared to publish any of Huebner's work since the Fischer CD in 2003?

Using Computers to Call into Question

Continuing with Gligoric - Fischer, Bled 1961, I had planned to do one more post related to The Pitfalls of Computer Analysis, but came up short. After the diagram in the 'Pitfalls' post, the game continued 21.Qxd3 Bd4+, leading to the following position.

Bled 1961
Fischer, Robert

Gligoric, Svetozar
After 21...Bg7-d4+

Here Kasparov continues analysis by Boleslavsky and Huebner, demonstrating that 22.Rf2 was stronger than Gligoric's 22.Kg2, to which Kasparov assigned a '?'. After 22.Rf2, the engine shows other variations not mentioned by Kasparov, but they all lead to the same type of game. White gets a Bishop and two Pawns for a Rook, giving him a comfortable edge. There isn't much more to be said for the position except that most players would prefer White and Black would ultimately be satisfied with a draw.

I've mentioned Huebner several times in this series on Fischer & Kasparov, mainly because Kasparov draws frequently on the German's comments. Since I've never investigated the source of Huebner's analysis, a digression is in order. Chessville.com offers World Champion Fischer by GM Robert Huebner, a 'ChessBase Monograph on CD, 2003', reviewed by Prof. Nagesh Havanur.

Although Huebner is prominently mentioned as the author of this CD, his role here is limited to writing a summary of Fischer's style and and work on various positions from My 60 Memorable Games. It is noteworthy that Kasparov has also made use of Huebner's path-breaking analysis in this CD for his authoritative work on Fischer, My Great Predecessors Part IV. However, Huebner's general conclusions on Fischer's play tend to be philosophical abstractions and do not have intrinsic merit.

John Watson Book Review #55, among other titles, also looked at World Champion Fischer; Robert Huebner; ChessBase 2003:

The core of the CD is Robert Huebner's analysis of Fischer's play, which parallels that of Alekhine in his CD that I previously criticised. I'm not fond of this one for the same reason, but since many people thought that I was unfair in that earlier case (probably true), I'll let him speak more for himself:

It is for this reason that I have decided to turn my attention to Fischer's famous game collection, "My Sixty Memorable Games". Most critics deem Fischer's comments to be entirely devoid of errors, and each and every one of his observations is accepted as gospel truth. I was plagued by the desire to find out whether this reputation is indeed justified.

It seems to me as if Fischer does not try to fathom the finer points of quiet positions with the same amount of care and attention that he gives to any number of tactical positions. When analyzing complex positions Fischer occasionally lacks the will to probe deeply, and contents himself with incomplete structural explanations and vague judgments. This deficiency is particularly obvious in some endgames. The selection of games for his book also reveals this trait. To my taste, there are too many games in this collection where no real struggle ensues. The opponents are pushed from the board without offering resistance, often after making serious errors in the opening; there is hardly any interesting material for analysis.

[...] The problem, I think, is that almost anyone, given time and a few computer engines, would be able to call into question almost any game or set of annotations by any player, perhaps not with the positional judgment of a Huebner but adequately enough. I don't see this as particularly interesting to anyone beyond the one doing the analysing (to whom it admittedly must be fascinating) and a small minority of players who don't want to do their own investigations and would rather read such technical criticisms than enjoy the unadulterated games of Fischer or a New in Chess Magazine.

If I substitute the name 'Kasparov' for 'Huebner', then Watson's summary judgement -- 'almost anyone, given time and a few computer engines, would be able to call into question almost any game or set of annotations by any player' -- points in the same direction that I find myself going with these posts on My Great Predecessors. There is an inherently unsatisfying quality about using a computer to critique work that was done without the aid of a computer. To then use this critique to form judgements about a person's psychology can easily be misleading and ultimately sinister.

Ostrale

Ostrale 10 © Flickr user febelix under Creative Commons.

What's Ostrale? My guess is this: Ostrale´010.

OSTRALE commenced in 2007 as a local initiative and has ever since achieved a broad reach within a short period of time. The exhibition represents the whole spectrum of contemporary art in an interdisciplinary way. Hundreds of national and international artists are invited to take part in the festival, which takes place at a meaningful architectural and historic industrial venue.

Dresden in particular has reached worldwide recognition, being known as "Florence of the Elbe". However, with OSTRALE the city has gained the potential to set a cultural and touristic antipole to its baroque history and to develop a historical generative, contemporary perspective to the classical exhibition format. Thus, today Dresden can expand its international significance in relation to "modernity".

For more Flickr photos, most unrelated to chess, see search/?q=Ostrale.

A Game Between Apollo and Mercury

Unlike the previous two posts on Top eBay Chess Items by Price (see White Christmas on Ebay for the most recent), the last two weeks presented slim pickings. The most unusual item, titled 'Hieronymus Vida, "Scacchia Ludus", 1547', received 10 bids and finally sold for US $860. The book's description read,

Marci Hieronymi Vidae Cremonensis Albae Episcopi Opera. Apud Seb. Gryphium, Lugduni (Lyons) 1547. • 360 pages. Contemporary limp vellum binding. 12,5 * 8 cm. • Bibliography: vdL II 259. L/N 4556. • Remarks: VG • Weight (Grams): 105

I recognize Bibliography: vdL as a reference to Antonius van der Linde and L/N must mean the 'Van der Linde - Niemeijeriana' collection in The Hague. A page on Vida and 'Scacchia Ludus' at Marco Gerolamo Vida describes the work as 'a game between Apollo and Mercury, in the presence of all the other Gods of Olimpus, during the celebration of the marriage between Ocean and Earth.' There is a translation by Oliver Goldsmith at Vida's Game of Chess
(readprint.com):

ARMIES of box that sportively engage
And mimic real battles in their rage,
Pleased I recount; how, smit with glory's charms,
Two mighty Monarchs met in adverse arms,

etc. etc.

Will the Real Taimanov Please Stand Up

After recently taking an interest in the Sicilian Taimanov System -- 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 e6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nc6 -- I ordered the book 'Sicilian Defense: Taimanov System' by Mark Taimanov. Imagine my confusion when the book arrived and I read in the 'Introduction',

The starting position 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 e6 5. Nc3 a6 can lead to various lines of play, each with its own strategy -- the Scheveningen System, the Paulsen System or the Taimanov System -- and in most cases it is Black who makes the choice (correspondingly 6...d6, 6...Qc7, and 6...Nge7).

Thus it is characteristic of the Taimanov System to avoid development of the Queen on c7 and Knight on f6 (both features of the Paulsen System) in favor of the mobilizing and flexible maneuvre ...Nge7. As will be seen from further analysis, this difference is important and gives the game an original strategic theme.

Never having understood that the Taimanov System included only ...Nge7, I looked for confirmation elsewhere. From the 'Introduction' to 'The Taimanov Sicilian' by Graham Burgess:-

Kan, Paulsen and Taimanov: All three of these names have some relevance to the subject-matter of this book.

'Kan' is the simplest to deal with: it refers to 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 e6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 a6. This can easily transpose to lines discussed in this book, but the name is generally reserved for those lines where Black does not play an early ...Nc6, or that could not arise naturally via a 4...Nc6 move-order.

'Paulsen' is trickier to define. It is sometimes taken to mean the same thing as the Kan, but is often used, particularly in German and Russian chess literature, to refer to lines with ...a6, ...Nc6 and ...Qc7. Taimanov himself calls this the Paulsen, reserving his own name for the less popular treatment with ...a6, ...Nc6 and ...Nge7. This policy has the serious drawback of leaving 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 e6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nc6 [DIAGRAM] as a nameless variation.

In this book, as is common in English-language chess literature, the 'Taimanov Variation' refers to the diagram position above. I believe Mark Taimanov deserves this honour, even if he does not wish to claim it himself, considering that he has played the position several hundred times over the last 40 years. To distinguish between the ...Nge7 and ...Qc7 treatments, I use the terms 'Pure Taimanov' and 'Paulsen' respectively.

ECO, with its avoidance of names, leaves the field open. In List of chess openings - Wikipedia, I found B41-B43 'Kan Variation' and B45-B49 'Taimanov Variation'. In Chess Archaeology - B20-B59, I found B41-B43 'Paulsen' and B45-B49 'Barnes'. Is that Thomas Wilson Barnes (1825-1874)? Maybe it's a generational thing.

The Pitfalls of Computer Analysis

In the first post on Gligoric - Fischer, Bled 1961, I highlighted the sequence starting 17...c5, based on the different evaluations of the two GMs: Fischer: '!' & Kasparov: '?!'. Since Kasparov called 20...d3, 'The key moment of the game', I wasn't too far off the mark. The resulting position is shown in the following diagram. Note that Black has already sacrificed one Pawn and is now sacrificing a second Pawn to create complications.

Bled 1961
Fischer, Robert

Gligoric, Svetozar
After 20...d4-d3

Gligoric played 21.Qxd3, and Fischer commented, 'A double-edged game would result from 21.Bxd3 Bd4+ 22.Kh1 Nxg3+ 23.Nxg3 Qxd6 24.Qc2 Bh3'. Kasparov, undoubtedly using the best hardware and software of the time, zeroed in on that comment and criticized Fischer of 'ignoring' 24.Qd2. He gave '24...g5?! 25.Qg2 Bd7 26.f4 Rxf4 27.Rxf4 Qxf4 28.Rf1 Qe3 29.Bf5, with a powerful attack on the light squares'. Jumping ahead a few years, my software prefers Fischer's 24.Qc2, and improves on Kasparov's analysis with 24.Qd2 g5 25.Qg2 Kh8. This takes the force out of 26.f4, by removing the King from the g-file.

Now I have to return to comments from Some Truths Cannot Be Proven?, where I expressed my doubts about this type of computer analysis. What's more interesting -- the move as played in competition (by Gligoric), the analysis without computers (by Fischer), or the progressive deepening of the position with the help of computers (by Kasparov)? I suspect a professional player would favor the first, a trainer the second, and a correspondence player the third. The problem with that third option is that it will never be finished.