Chess Personality Test

A few days ago my chess friend and correspondent, Larry Smith, sent me a position from a game he had played against his computer. Larry was White: White to move. FEN: r1b4k/pp2N2p/4p2Q/3pP2B/3b4/P7/KP3r2/8 w – – 0 1 First of all, let me say I’m glad...

Murder, Shirov wrote

Many of you have probably already seen the game from earlier this month where Viswanathan Anand destroyed Alexei Shirov (as Black!) in 17 moves. However, I feel as if I should say something about it because it is an ultra-rare appearance in top-level chess of an...

I’ve Been Working on the Caro …

… All the live-long day! (Sorry about the reference to a nineteenth-century folk song that is probably best forgotten.) Anyway, Michael Goeller posted a comment a week ago that set me off on another serious binge of Caro-Kann study. He pointed out this post in...

Bird by Bird

“Bird by Bird” is the title of a wonderful book on writing by Anne Lamott, and it’s also as good a title as any for my next series of posts on opening analysis. Yes, we’re going to reach into Dana’s Secret Chess File ™ once again...