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Nanobrain's Books Kibitzes

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BW-SugarDom

Jan-30-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: You mean not one of you has experienced sitting on a chair, staring intently at your computer playing a chess game, then your girlfriend/wife comes, newly bathed, wants sex, and decides to hump you right then and there while your mind is still occupied with the game and, when you reached the peak, that's also the time you see the brilliant, winning move, and later you wonder was it the extreme pleasure which made you see the move, or was it just an irrelevant or a fanciful coincidence?

"The most remarkable manifestation of the overlap between chess and love is found in a treatise with the intriguing title 'Le Livre des Echecs Amoureux Moralises', loosely translated as 'The Edifying Book of Erotic Chess'. There are several things one must know before tackling this extraordinary work. It was written around 1400 by Evrart de Conty, a physician associated with the University of Paris and with the court of the French king Charles VI...(to be continued}"

 

Jan-16-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: In Scandinavian folklore, a TROLL is a fabulous being, sometimes a giant or a dwarf dwelling in a cave. How, then, can we follow Messrs. Bradah/SugarDom's advice to ignore trolls, when we all love what is fabulous? Without trolls, life in this corner of cyberspace would be a meaningless void, with Alimatok forever sighing how boring life is....By the way, whoever gave that definition of "troll" [pasensiya na, pero tinatamad akong mag-scroll back to find out. Was it artoo?] himself added a "troll"[as he defined it] after his definition when he wrote that trolls usually have deprived childhoods, etc. Too bad no one reacted to it except me [now], so I guess I now had been "trolled"..... Wordfunph, you are welcome. Have you read Marilyn Yalom's book, "Birth of the Chess Queen" [1st published in 2004]? The book has trivia which you would like for sure. An ENTIRE book is devoted to the history of only ONE chess piece, the queen. Mine is a paperback copy of almost 300 pages, but when I was in Cebu, I saw a hardbound copy of the book on sale in one bookstore in a mall for only less than P200. I didn't buy it since I had a copy already....Betasigma, "talipandas" is similar to "haliparot" and "hunghang". If I'm not mistaken, I got these from reading either or both Rizal's Noli Me Tangere and El Filibusterismo IN TAGALOG when I was in a public high school many years ago....God, I miss 7Heaven and Midnightsun already!
Oct-27-08
Eugenio Torre
nanobrain: <wordfunph> 8 days nonstop? No sleep? They must have been using shabu, like most bus drivers. No hope for me beating that record. After just 24 hours, my knees shake already, and I begin to fart a lot. <spawn2> Do you know if Stuart Rachels had already finished/published his book "Philosophy Looks at Chess"? Must be another interesting read.

Novels with chess as theme are also good. Some of my recent readings are "The Eight" by Katherine Neville and "The Chess Machine" by Robert Lohr. Victor Korchnoi is a great player, but his autobiography is boring (mainly because he doesn't write well, although his life is dramatic).

 

Oct-25-08
Eugenio Torre
nanobrain: <spawn2> At the Cutting Edge (with branches at Megamall, Trinoma, etc) they have the Excalibur Game Time II digital chess clock. Very nice. Costs around P2,600 if I remember right. Speaking of chess addiction, I once played from 9am to 12 midnight nonstop chess WITHOUT EATING OR DRINKING ANYTHING. Occasionally, I would also play 24 hours straight without sleeping, but with food and drinks. After playing 24 hours nonstop, I couldn't sleep. But when sleep hits me hours later, I could sleep 24 hours nonstop also.

Is there already a Guinness Book of Records entry for the longest nonstop chess play?

One chess article says that the greatest chess book ever written is J.H. Donner's "The King". I have read it. But the three chess books I've enjoyed the most are "The Immortal Game: A History of Chess" by David Shenk, "King's Gambit: A Son, a Father, and the World's Most Dangerous Game" by Paul Hoffman, and the one entiled "Smart Chip from St. Petersburg" [Genna Sosonko I think is the author, not sure, my copy was borrowed and has not been returned]. Honorable mention could be "Bobby Fischer Goes to War" by David Edmonds and John Eidinow, and the historical "Birth of the Chess Queen" by Marilyn Yalom.

 

granyid

"i got nice reading here..just checking this if i can buy in amazon just following footsteps, reading, reading, till i get chalked out of breath...."

mysql

How about buying an audiobook so that you can listen instead of reading. Sealed

BW-SugarDom
Mar-05-09
Eugenio Torre
nanobrain: Today, 11am, at Kamay-Kainan, No.2 Malamig St. corner Kalayaan Avenue, Quezon City...

Me to a pretty waitress}: Magpapa-reserve ako ng seats for this coming saturday, March 7, lunchtime 11am.

Waitress[checking the reservation book]: Naku, sir, mukhang wala ng available. Full na ho kami sa Sabado. Mga ilang tao ho ba?

Me: Mga 7 to 10 persons siguro. Gawan mo ng paraan. Importanteng event ito.

Waitress: Rico, halika nga dito! Tingnan mo nga kung pwede pa ito.

Rico[after checking and rechecking the reservation book: Sige, sir. Kanino hong pangalan ito?

Me[after giving my name]: Sigurado yan ha? Baka pag pumunta na kami dito wala kaming table?

Rico: Sigurado na yan sir. Hanapin nyo lang ako pag may problema.

Me: Sige. Pero sa table, huwag pangalan ko ang ilagay mo. Ang ilagay mo "BARANGAY WESLEY".

Pretty Waitress: Parang alam ko yan a. Sa Cubao ho ba yang barangay na yan?

Me: hindi. Yan lang ang pangalan ng fans club namin.

Rico and Waitress: Syanga ho? Artista ho?

Me: hindi. Si Wesley So. Yung batang chess grandmaster.

Rico and Pretty Waitress: Ay, oho. Kilala ho namin yun!

Pretty Waitress [excited]: Pupunta din ho ba sya dito sa Sabado?

Me: hindi e. Mahiyain daw e. Kami lang, mga fans nya.

Pretty Waitress[disappointed]: ayy...

K-K's tel nos. are 9215904 and 9241998. Rico is the man to call for anything.

<jpsacristan> since you are leaving by 1pm, pumunta ka na dun ng 11am and with or without us, take one seat dun sa bgy wesley table, order your drink, AND START EATING. Sayang naman ang buffet kung di ka makakahataw ng husto for lack of time. That goes too dun sa ibang early birds. Hindi naman tayo dun makakarating ng sabay-sabay.

Knyt4k, please reconsider lunch. Umabsent ka na muna dyan sa pagto-tourist guide mo sa Corregidor. Mas importante ang chess. ULOL! [U Laugh Out Loud!]

 

Feb-15-09
Eugenio Torre
nanobrain: aaah, talagang addict sa trivia si <wordfunph>, hindi naka-resist dun sa offer ko na trivia book! So see you there, wordfun!

I suggest na komo marami na tayo doon, we wear nametags[nakadikit sa may right breast portion ng shirt] para kung may picture taking, o video, the other kibitzers would know kaagad by viewing the pictures/video kung sino sila wordfunph, eng.jm, etc.

I thought of tagging along my wife to take video pero mas mabuti siguro purely kibitzers muna ang nandun. I won't bring any second. I want to sink or swim on my own sa laban namin ni Spawn2, kahit na mala-Eugene Torre daw ang tira nito.

I will bring some chess sets pero to those planning to bring their own I would advice huwag yung tournament size kasi the tables at McDo would be quite small for that. A little smaller than the tournament size would be ok.

It will be a fun day...But prepare to get shocked. Kasi oftentimes one forms an idea of how a certain person looks like from the alias he uses [like <Winter> for example, tipong parang puti na blue-eyed, kasi winter e] and would look completely different sa personal. Ang tipong mukhang transparent lang dito e si <eng.jm> na pati totoong pangalan, edad, address, etc. e naka-disclosed na. I imagine him to be really totoy na totoy, kasi namumupo pa e.

See you all sa March 7!

 

Feb-13-09
Eugenio Torre
nanobrain: <wordfunph> forget about the live moves. This book is TRIVIA from the first page to the last. And for free! At wala ka pang kopya! This book is your soulmate!
Feb-13-09
Eugenio Torre
nanobrain: <Spawn2> confirmed na yun. March 7, 2009 11am Kamay Kainan, Kalayaan Ave, near QC Hall, across Trellis restaurant. No need to contribute kung 6 lang tayo, so syempre, kasama ka dun <engr.jm>. I will take care of lunch and our coffee/drinks and snacks at McDo while playing. Kung sumobra lang siguro sa 6 persons, that's the time yung ambag ng mayayaman sa inyo will be welcomed. And it should not only be us two ang maglalaro. Maybe engr.jm vs. pulsar would also be interesting. or Karpov vs. 321y. Announcement: if wordfunph appears on march 7, I will give him my copy of Marilyn Yalom's "Birth of the Chess Queen" GRATIS ET AMORE. bUT he must confirm his participation before march 7 otherwise I won't have the reason to bring the book on march 7. This 241-page book is entirely trivia wordfun. With colored pictures pa. And, get this, it's trivia for only only chess piece: the queen. So, trivia guy, maglalaway ka just thinking about it. And this special offer is good only for march 7. It won't happen again.
Feb-13-09
Eugenio Torre
nanobrain: <Spawn2>, <engr.jm>, <kapmigz> ok na ako sa March 7, 2009. 11am. But instead of Sulo Hotel [where the buffet costs around 1k per person] sa Kamay Kainan buffet na lang tayo, also near QC Hall, along Kalayaan st., across Trellis Restaurant. May lunch buffet din dun [mas mura, he, he.] . Then we can play siguro at the McDonald's nearby [near sulo hotel], aircon dun, all we need to do is to buy coffee to make us customers or, if you like, we can go to qc circle. Pasensya na for the late reply, hindi kasi ako nagko-computer araw-araw e. Walang panahon. Kahit may laro si Wesley, minsan natitingnan ko na lang mga posts ninyo after 3 games are finished. <wordfunph> and <karpov2985> join us sa march 7. Kaya pa ng budget ko ang dalawa, he,he. Bring one can of Century Tuna para kung sinong manalo yun ang premyo. Then we can officially call it "The Battle for the Century". Ninenerbyos na si Spawn2. I used to feel like that years ago when I was still playing for a European chess club ...[lalong ninerbyos si Spawn2, he, he. Sarap mag psy-war...}. Wala akong chess program at hindi ako nagko-computer chess, Spawn2. Iisa lang ang chess book ko at memoryado ko ito from cover-to-cover. It's Eric Schiller's "Unorthodox Chess Openings". I suggest kabisahin mo na yan for our March 7 date.
Feb-10-09
Eugenio Torre
nanobrain: For this historic [kuno] occasion I'm treating <Spawn2> to lunch at the Sulo Hotel, near Quezon City hall, Saturday, February 21, 2009, and after filling ourselves up, we shall proceed elsewhere to stage the Batil, este, Battle of the Century. See you there at the hotel lobby around 11am <Spawn2>. I will put a chessboard over my head so you will know it's me. I will bring the set and the clock.

<Wordfunph> I think I haven't missed any of B. Ang's columns. Are you sure he had explained why Torre's book hasn't come out? At meron na palang Book 2 yung Inside Philippine Chess? I remember seeing book 1 at Powerbooks pero wala yatang bumibili. Now they don't carry the title anymore.

 

Feb-09-09
Eugenio Torre
nanobrain: Ano na nga pala ang nangyari dun sa libro daw [biography o collection of games?] ni Eugene Torre. Last year yata[o in 2007?], in his Businessworld column, Bobby Ang wrote several times na lalabas na ito by December[2007 0 2008?]. Pero hanggang ngayon wala pa. He even mentioned na meron na silang nakuha [mayamang tao, but i forgot his name] na magpi-finance ng publication ng book. Meron ba kayong alam na tsismis kung anong nangyari dito? Wala namang sinusulat si Bobby Ang dito [sya nga yata yung author dapat e].

<Spawn2> I saw na taga Novaliches ka lang pala. Why don't we play a 30-minute recorded game and post it here or dun sa Wesley page for fun's sake? No one has done that before di ba? We will be the first! Kasi naisip ko, panay dakdakan na lang ang nangyayari sa atin dito, wala ng naglalaro e di ba chess is a GAME first and foremost?

 

Feb-03-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: To make the book a bestseller, it should cater to other people as well like the: 1. history buffs--we devote a chapter sa mga magulang at ninuno ni Wesley, tracing them as far back as the Ming Dynasty; 2. serious chessplayers--IM Bordonada will annotate Wesley's games; 3. Wesley's opponents--Midnightsun88 will lend us his expertise and point out to us the weaknesses in Wesley's play; 4. romantics--sex and romance sell, so ipaubaya nyo na sa akin ang isang chapter sa romansa/ligawan nila will and leny, kasama na dun ang mainit na romansa nila nung mabuo nila ang ating bagong bayani [yan e kung natatandaan pa nila kung saan at kung kailan ito nangyari. Madali lang naman siguro kasi birthday lang ni Wesley yan minus 9 months]; at 5.pedophiles--maganda sa libro yung mga mga colored pictures, so with Wesley's permission, lagyan natin ng mga baby pictures nya na nakahubad, at adult pictures ni Alimatok, stolen shots habang lasing na lasing sya.
Feb-03-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: Seriously, this thought came to me [muntik ko ng sabihin na this thought came to my mind, na babanatan ako ni GreenArrow na tautology din]...I think this is bound to happen sooner or later. I can't remember names, especially while reading fast, but one of you here is a [former?]journalist daw who dream of writing a book, one is a bibliophile daw [we hope he reads the books he's collecting], one [several?] is a trivia master, several are techie/research experts. Why don't we write/publish a book about Wesly So? Sooner or later magkakaroon nito.Di ba when Torre became a GM he had a book kaagad entitled "Beyond the 13th Move"? Why don't we contribute Php20,000.00 each[or less since marami na tayo dito], put up a corporation where we will have equal shares, then pool our talents/resources to come up with a book with the coporation as the publisher and copyright holder? Ideas: di ba chess now would be part of the school curriculum? The book can be the textbook for Philippine schools, basta may chapter on how to play chess or play it well, or history ng laro. Kung si Fischer may "Bobby Fischer Teaches Chess" pwedeng we come out with something like "Learn From Chess Through Wesley". At kung kumita, we give a certain percentage to Wesley para naman may madudukot sya pag matanda na sya at hindi na sikat.
Jan-30-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: "As a manual of seduction, 'The Book of Erotic Chess' allowed women to play an active role as well as men. Indeed, it was the woman who made the first move of the match, not only because she played with the white pieces, but presumably because she initiated the course of love through her most strategic weapon--beauty. The man was portrayed as defensive from the start and ultimately defeated by his partner's greater skill in chess and emotional maturity. At the game's end, he still has much to learn." -Marilyn Yalom

Among the questions in my ongoing survey is this: WHICH GIVES YOU MORE PLEASURE, FINDING A BRILLIANT, WINNING MOVE IN A GAME OF CHESS OR EJACULATING/HAVING AN ORGASM?

This is a serious, scientific research. Imagine, if we can prove scientifically that sexual pleasure is directly linked with good chess moves then we can have a very potent weapon to beat all the others[even the Russians] as all we have to do, in the Olympiad, for example, is to require our players to secretly jack off under the table while playing crucial games. Wa'dya think, mates?

 

BW-SugarDom
Jun-30-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: Dam that c3, I was winning vs sniper when it went out of service!

<Pulsar>, i dont remember. I remember reading a lot of Toltoys during my AB days but I dont remember their stories anymore. I only remember how THICK two of them were, Whore and Peace and Anna Karnenila. Why don't you educate us here by telling us why the death of Ivan looked horrible to you? Baka matandaan ko kung nabasa ko na yan.

<Knyt4k> before you leave, please dont forget to return to me the Albert Camus book you borrowed from me 32 years ago. And thanks for reminding me recently that it's still with you.

Anybody here has read Invitation to a Beheading by Nabokov? Tell me naman the story. Maybe there'll be a similarity here between Pulsar's Ivan and whoever is the bida here.

Was it also you, Pulsar, who once loudly observed here that most chessplayers e madudumi and hindi naliligo? Describing his chessplaying hero in The Luzhin Defense, Nabokov wrote in the Foreword to the book in 1963:

"He is uncouth, unwashed, uncomely--but as my gentle young lady [a dear girl in her own right] so quickly notices, <there is something in him that transcends both the coarseness of his gray flesh and the sterility of his recondite genius>". [emphasis mine].

You will all grow old like me. I tell you, when you get to my age, the thing you would miss most is your mind. And when you reach that stage, it would benefit you a lot if you had memorized this phrase so you can mumble it to yourself over and over again: "there is something in me that transcends both the coarseness of my gray flesh and the sterility of my recondite genius. There is something in me..."

Jun-30-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: I get along without you very well
Of course I do
Except when soft rains fall
And drip from leaves, then I recall
The thrill of being sheltered
In your arms
Of course I do
But I get along without you very well
I've forgotten you
Just like I said I would
Of course I have
Or maybe except when I hear
Your name
Someone's laugh is just the same
I've forgotten you just like I should
What a game!
What a fool am I
To think my aching heart
Could kid the moon
What's in store?
Should I play once more?
No,no,no,no,no it's best
That I stick to my tune
I said that I get along
Without you, very well
Of course I do
Except perhaps in summer
But then I should never ever
Think of summer
For that would surely
Break my heart in two!

When I die, as they say that the last thing that goes is one's sense of hearing, I'd like to hear my wife's voice as my life slowly ebbs away. But no, I don't want to hear any stupid passages from the Tibetan Book of the Dead, or even prayers, or she telling me she loves me [as I know that already]. Instead, I want to hear her softly whispering my favorite opening's moves, e4,d5,exd5,Qxd5,Nc3...Then I would like to go at that point when the position had become critical, with me thinking: what should be next, what's the best move? I'd like myself to end wondering, and not in fear.

May-30-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: Class, if you will notice in my last post, I ended it with the title of a dictionary and its year of publication. What is that? {Sugardom raises his hand]. Yes, Sugardom? Sir, that's called a CITATION! Yes, but what is the function of a citation? Sir, that indicates the source or support of the writer's statement preceding it. OK, that's good Sugardom. Now sit down and stop scratching your balls.

Citation. After my previous lecture, our star pupil <Butonichavit>, the angry one, asked loudly why I said that adultery is the same as murder. But remember, class, that in that lecture I gave the Book of James as a citation for that assertion. And what does the Book of James say?--

"Whoever falls into sin on one point of the law, even though he keeps the entire remainder, has become guilty on ALL counts. For he who said 'You shall not commit adultery' also said, 'You shall not kill.' If therefore you do not commit adultery but do commit murder, you have become a transgressor of the law." [James 2:11].

I had gone from adultery to murder only to further illustrate the hypocrisy of the prevalent reaction to the hero's sex tapes with the women: a disgust and complete hatred about the fact that the sex acts were filmed and exhibited, but with no similar condemnation as regards the illicit sex itself. So in murder, it would be like a yawn for the act of murder itself, but a complete agitation if the act was filmed and exhibited. That was the point of the argument and why James was cited! By the way, I forgot to add then that the commandment was: thou shall not commit adultery. There was no 11th commandment which says thou shall not videocam the adultery and show it to others.

May-28-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: "Patently offensive as measured by contemporary community standards"--that's where your argument sinks, <Bradah>. Honestly, do you know what this means? How do you distinguish between a simply "offensive", to a "PATENTLY offensive"? And when you would "measure" a post here to determine if it is patently offensive, which "community" will you look at? The Philippine community, that in Iran, the entire world, the kibitzers at BW, or the entire CG? Whichever you pick, tell us HOW can you determine the "standards" of this community?

Here, for example, you protested against my post and <prensdepens> openly agreed with you. Would you now consider that as THE "contemporary community standard" now? HOwever, what happens to the view of, say, <TugasKamagong>, the orgasm expert, who openly boasted here, in the hallowed grounds of BW, that he has had an orgasm of almost 29 minutes? Or of <Winter>, the wordsmith, and a closeted admirer of Marquis de Sade? Or of our venerable <Sir Glenn> who shyly expressed his happiness and admiration for the musings on sex and chess here?

Why do you think that whenever the Film Academy would "censor" a sexy film, people would protest? It's because insofar as obscenity is concerned, there is really no fixed standard. Phrases like "patently offensive applying contemporary community standards" are really just platoon of words lost in the jungle of reality, aimlessly roaming around in search of meaning. Plain @#$%*&!#, to make it short. Yet, because of their ambiguity, concepts like this are favorites of the Ayatollahs and dictators of this world since precisely because of their malleability, those who want to impose their will on others can easily manipulate these @#$%*&!#s to suit their purpose. This book is banned! Why? It's obscene! Why obscene? It is patently offensive as measured by contemporary community standards! Sez who? Sez me! Who did the measuring? I did! I disagree, a lot of my friends and neighbors like this book and finds nothing offensive in it. Hang this pervert! Look for his friends and neighbors and hang them too!

May-18-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: Just arrived home after jogging at UP Diliman}. I've discovered two bookstores there selling 2nd hand pero really kick-ass books [selected, no cheap novels]. One is between the post office and the coop, the other is in a mezzanine of a store selling donuts downstairs at the so-called "shopping center". At the latter, merong mga chess books pero mga luma na, tipong mga Horowitz, Reuben fine, Irving Chernev, etc. Isa lang ang binili ko, "Chess Twisters" by Burt Hochberg at a grand price of P195.00. Aside from this i also bought the following:

1. biography of the poet Sylvia Plath [nagpakamatay ito at a very young age, P125.00;

2. The Wisdom of Alexander the Great by Lance Kurke, P295.00;

3.Anguished English: An Anthology of Accidental Assaults Upon Our Language by Richard Lederer, P195.00.; and last, but not the least--

4. QPB Mammoth Book of Erotica {with really serious contributors like J.G. Ballard], P225.00.

Yun lang.

May-12-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: The main reason why I went to the BW event last saturday was because <wordfunph> texted me several days before that <Sugardom> will be there. Many pages back, <wordfunph> even gave us a internet site where he said we would be able to see what <Sugardom> looks like but when I went there, I saw nothing but naked women [which was even better but, still...].

<Pulsar>, honestly too, a premium membership at CG [I do not, in fact, really know how good this is, that was why I even asked you last saturday] would just be wasted on me. I am sure I wouldn't have the time, or even the interest, to take full advantage of what benefits such membership will bring.

<Winter>, you are not an engineer. You are a wordsmith or, maybe, an "engineer of words". Your piece about the fictional <LN> delivering a soliloquy about his non-fictional insanity is a masterpiece, completely capturing the tone and flavor of Marquis de Sade, whose 120 Days of Sodom is my favorite book of all time.

<Butonichavit> no offense taken. For me, yung mga buskahan dito are only for laughs. That's why I love everybody here, even the likes of <lordnigel>.Ang danger nga lang, some of us here are indeed insane, or close to being insane, and when they feel threatened, would withdraw inside their own delusional world and would never be seen again. Like Fischer did.

I suspect that is what is happening now to <lordnigel>. After we pray for Wesley before his tournament starts, I suggest we also pray for our dear <lordnigel> na huwag naman sanang tuluyang ma-buang.

Mar-13-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: <wordfunph> I don't have that many chess books. Chess materials I accumulated when I was in high school and at the UST, all long gone. Either pinamigay ko o itinapon. I completely lost interest in the game before I left UST. I concentrated on my studies [UP Law, batch '85]. Thereafter, when I was already in law practice, a doctor-client of mine gave these books to me:

1. The Soviet Championships by Bernard Cafferty and Mark Taimanov,

2. Garry Kasparov's Fighting Chess by GK, Jon Speelman and Bob Wade;

3. Zurich International Chess Tournament 1953 by David Bronstein;

4. Endgame Preparation by Jon Speelman;

5. Paul Keres: The Road to the Top by PK;

6. Paul Keres: The Quest for Perfection by PK and John Nunn;

7. The Complete Games of Bobby Fischer by Robert Wade and Kevin O'Connell [english notation, 1992 ed];

8. My 60 Memorable Games by B.Fischer;

9. Rubinstein's Chess Masterpieces:100 Selected Games-annoteted by Hans Kmoch;

10. Think Like a Grandmaster by Alexander Kotov;

11. Play Like a Grandmaster by Alexander Kotov;

12. Chess Fundamentals by J. Capablanca.

From there, every now and then, I would buy to add to my collections. But don't be impressed with these because like most of us, I haven't really read these books yet[I just often surrender to the COMPULSION to buy and buy].

Last year, my brother went on a trip to the US and, along the way, bought a copy of "The Immortal Game: A History of Chess [or How 32 Carved Pieces on a Board Illuminated Our Understanding of War, Art, Science, and the Human Brain]" intending to give it to me as his xmas gift. When he knew I already had a copy way back Oct. 6, 2006 [i have this habit of putting the date of acquisition in every book i buy or get], he kept the book and bought me another xmas gift. If ever, kung wala talaga kayong makita, my brother has a copy. No chess lover should die without reading this book!

Mar-12-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: <geniokov> it's 3:50 pm here in Quezon City and we are fine, reuben.

<pulsar> when is wordfunph's bday and how young is he na?

<jpsac> kala ko u wanna borrow my Immortal G? Dimopako tinetex.

Bakit hindi tayo magpahiraman o mag-swap ng mga chess books dito para makatipid?

Sa isang article sa isang magazine sabi doon ang greatest chess book daw of all time e yung THE KING ni J.H. Donner [Dutch GM, patay na]. Meron ako nito.

But I enjoyed more yung SMART CHIP FROM ST. PETERSBURG ni G. Sosonko. Pero hiniram nung isang surgeon sa East Ave. Medical Center at hanggang ngayon e di pa isinosoli [ksama yung Chess is My Life ni V. Korchnoi--do you know na pag bumili ka ng libro nito e may kasamang CD with Korchnoi's games? Ang nakapagtataka, nung ipasaksak ko sa computer sa anak ko, lahat ng games starts with d4. Dunno why}

Mar-11-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: <JoseMacuteJr> si Engr. Galano ay may kaibigan ding isa pang chessplayer, si Engr. Macario Villones na very unique maglaro dahil maysakit yata sya nung sakit ni Muhammad Ali at Michael J. Fox [i forget the name of this ailment} so pag tumitira itong si Engr. Villones e nahahawi yung mga pyesa sa board kasi uncontrollable yung paggalaw ng kamay nya.

<Wordfunph>, dalawa ba ang cell nos mo? I know ikaw ang nag-text sa kin kanina using 09103027266 pero in my directory you also have 09228254737. Mahirap magka-moniker si Wesley. "The Gentle Mauler" is good, for now. Pero pag nag-mature na sya, hindi na magiging "gentle" yung itsura nya, lalo na at nagka-bigote na. "The Messiah" ni Timhortons would be OK if Phil chess would, indeed, resurrect after Wesley. Pero papano kung hindi? And it's seldom that chessplayers acquire monikers. Pacquiao, Pagulayan got their monikers from their names, Shirov[fire on board] and Samboy Lim from the way they play, Anand [tiger from madras] from where he came from, etc. E si Wesley? Very difficult to conjure something from his name. His style of play is still developing. Alangan namang "the Brain from Bacoor"? Or since he is the titular head of our Barangay, will he be "The Sultan"? Or "The Mating Sultan" [as with his boyish good looks, he may be tempted to maintain a harem later when he grows up]?

<Lemon69> good suggestion [friendly games among barangay members]. Let's divide ourselves into two teams and let's make it a battle between good and evil.

We go by our names. For example, Wordfunph should be in the Evil Team because wordfun is similar to Batman's JOKER--a contravida [fun=joke; joking=making fun of words, wordfun]. Kibitzer like Winter naman should be in the Good Team coz Winter is like STORM dun sa X-Men [or was it Fantastic Four?]--a bida. My friend <knyt4k>, evil team coz the devil always carries a fork. <Lemon69>, evil team too coz it suggests squeezing lemon in the genitalias then doing a 69. Spawn2 is definitely good team coz Spawn is a comic book hero. Nanobrain is good team, coz it suggests a brain that can go small, like superheroes that can change shapes/sizes [think Lastikman]. Timhortons is good team, coz he reminds us of Jollibee and Ronald McDonald. Sugardom is evil team coz its sugar daddy and dirty old men.

Mar-09-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: <Rookdens> Binan the hometown of the POPE? Diko na-gets. Did I miss a joke here? Sino yung Pope? And yung "dalawa"?

<Deadlost> <Kurtrichards> based on your stories, looks like the Bancod I'm looking for is neither Rey nor Ronald. I graduated at UST AB 1981 and my player Bancod was also in AB UST with me ahead by 1 or 2 years so he could not have been the 15 yr old Bancod Deadlost played against in 1983. Kurtrichards' Bancod was also in UE.

<Pulsar>, I have that Immortal Game book. When I read it, it was like falling in love with chess the second time. If you want to borrow it, just see me. Hardbound yung copy ko.

<jpsacristan> <zanshin> <spawn2> briefly, again, about the game: I was nervous up to move 8. But when I got to play 9.e5 lumuwag dibdib ko. From then on, parang controlled ko yung center at walang masyadong galaw yung black. Kaya nga pati yung bishop nya galing b7, punta sa a6 then atras sa c8. IMHO, 8...e5 was the move for spawn2.

<rookdens> <zk2> The brief history of BCT as far as I recall:

1. Spawn2 and I agreed to play, others said they want to watch;

2. No prize, so I jokingly said we bring a can of Century Tuna and whoever wins gets it as prize, so it will be called The Battle FOR the Century Tuna;

3. Kapmigz sponsored the prize [1 night stay at Manila Hotel];

4. One of us here[i forgot who] started calling it The Battle OF the Century Tuna, and it stuck;

5. Somebody abbreviated it to BCT.

BW-SugarDom
Dec-04-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: A book on Wesley?

Very difficult without <money>.

However, there's a simpler book we could write about him which would cost less money to write.

You notice that in Wesley's best games his moves always contain some kind of poison, and the opponents who succumb to them would "die"[get beaten] as if hit by some kind of a deadly viral infection? And which viral infection is the worse one can die of? Rabies.

So we write a book about Wesley's games combining it with stories/anecdotes about his fans and their silly quarrels. Very easy research on this. Title of the book: "THE RABID FANS AND GAMES OF WESLEY SO".

Whaddya think amigos?

Nov-30-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: First time I've seen 8.a4. Usually, white allows b5, and he plays c5. Is 8.a4 book line?
Nov-25-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: I have a black candle ready now and a book on spells. Since it is not good to put hexes on people, I will just put a hex on a move. Let's see,...black's <27th> move. "May it be weak, may it be wrong. May it bring the collapse of the mind of the hand that moves it..."[make this chant three times while the candle burns].
Nov-07-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: The baboons have stopped, probably they themselves were bored by their posts. That is the problem with having very little inside your head. You will run out of ammunitions.

If they can read, highly recommended for them would be the book "Malcontents: The Best, Cynical and Satirical Writing in the World" edited by Joe Queenan. Learn from the masters: Aristophanes, Juvenal, Machiavelli, Cervantes, Moliere, Voltaire, Marquis de Sade.

Nov-01-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: I am confirming my attendance tomorrow at 10am.

It is only now that I'm kibitzing not only because we had no electricity/internet connection yesterday, but also because I was busy reviewing Wesley's games to prepare a surprise defense for my player Shintaro Go tomorrow for whom I will act as a second.

I discovered, in the course of my research that never has Wesley faced the <Horny Defence> in his entire career. This defence was published way, way back--in 1824 to be exact--so Wesley does not know this. It was in a book, <Anweisung das Schachspiel> written by <Johann Horny>, a theatre actor.

Wesley, better prepare for our <Horny Defence>!

Oct-29-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: If it's raining hard, I will also commute. Very expensive ang repair for vehicles submerged in water.

I don't like to play also. But I have suggestions about the simul.

From past posts it seems the prevailing sentiment among BW members is that Wesley will wipe out BW in all 10 boards. The ten players should disabuse their minds of this notion. They will sit across the boards to <play>, not to get flogged. They should strive to win and believe they can win. During the games, they should show no respect for Wesley. Their aim must be to win by whatever means: via the game, or by time forfeit.

With Wesley's very limited time for ten boards, BW players must form a strategy of blanking Wesley, BW 10 - Wesley 0. Something like this:

1. Prepare book openings of up to 15 moves or so against Wesley's expected 1.e4 or the probable 1.d4. You can start memorizing these book openings now;

2. Go into a complicated middlegame in all ten boards so Wesley will consume so much time thinking. If, for example, Boards 1 to 8 are easy games, they are as good as dead. The same with Boards 9 and 10 even if the BW there puts up a good fight. So all ten boards must give Wesley difficulties and eat up his time;

3. When Wesley gets to your board, make a pass. Then as soon as he goes away, make a move and punch your clock. That way, you can put him in severe time pressure later;

4. In critical situations, some BW mirons like me may see some great moves for you [kibitzers always see better than the players themselves]. Look around once in a while, when Wesley and Sugardom are not looking, and maybe you can get helpful tips from the kibitzers.

Go, go BW! 10 - 0!

Oct-21-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: I've just read a thick book, published in 2007, authors are Americans, entitled TEARS IN THE DARKNESS: THE STORY OF THE BATAAN DEATH MARCH AND ITS AFTERMATH. From its copious footnotes and all, you could very well see that it was a very well-researched book. The authors had to travel and check libraries in various parts of the world, interview WW2 Japanese, Filipino and American soldiers, they had resource persons from everywhere [including some historians from UP], visited the sites, and even walked the Bataan Death March route.

That's how to write a good book. You look everywhere for materials. And for this, one needs money and time.

Oct-20-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: Thank you very much <Timhortons>! What I like about Hexilon Dela Cruz Punongbayan is that he plays near perfect chess. If you will see from his page, except for one game where he won, all his featured games from the Olympiad were losses. No draws. All losses. So almost perfect. In Martin Amis' book, "Koba the Dread: Laughter and the Twenty Million", he calls this kind of perfection a "negative perfection". The book is about Josef Stalin, whose failed projects for the USSR cost around 20 million of his countrymen's lives.

Perfection, I believe, is an achievement whether it be in a positive or in a negative way. Girlfriend-wise, Hexilon is almost perfect also, but this time, in a positive way. Mukhang Pinay din ang syota nya, at cute, so his lovelife would also be near perfect.

Long live our kababayan Hexilon Dela Cruz Punongbayan!

Oct-03-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: In verbal tussles against the invaders, there's one weapon which I find to be seldom used here--euphemisms. The art of making coded understatements.

Instead of saying that a kibitzer is a LIAR, for example, you may write that he [kibitzer] "gives colorful accounts of his exploits". In a book about obituaries I found these useful euphemisms and their real meanings:

1.A convivial fellow --alcoholic!;
2. Affable and hospitable every hour --chronic alcoholic!; 3. He values his privacy! -- gay!;
4. He <enjoys> his privacy -- raging queen!; 5. No discernible enthusiasm for civil rights --Nazi!; 6. Powerful negotiator --bully!;
7. Tireless raconteur --crushing bore!;
8. Attached to his theories and sometimes urges others too strongly --religious fanatic! 9. Fun-loving and flirtatious -- sex maniac!;
10. An uncompromisingly direct ladies' man -- a flasher and rapist!

You can criticize a player without sounding offensive. If, after a blunder, you want to say that a player is an idiot, you can instead say that he is a NATURAL. It would sound nice, although in the Oxford Dictionary of Euphemisms, a "natural" is an idiot.

Jul-19-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: As a songwriter, Sugar has no equal. I like his extended[original] version by Don Mclean [mine was the shorter version by Josh Groban], and I hope this won't be erased by the censors. You can really see how inaapi we are here, with my short song having been erased twice, while tpstar's gangsta rap above polluting this page for all eternity.

Speaking of saga, I remember reading the saga of Ferdinand Magellan's circumnavigation of the world from 1519 to 1522. Did you know that before he was killed in the Island of Mactan by Lapu-Lapu's men FM and/or his men [led by his chronicler, Antonio Pigafetta] had an orgy in Cebu courtesy of Rajah Humabon? It was truly an triple x-rated affair, with them not only having sex with Cebuanas, but even watching the local guys and girls going at it.

Let me now exercise my fingers by reproducing here the pertinent passages of the book OVER THE EDGE OF THE WORLD: MAGELLAN'S TERRIFYING CIRCUMNAVIGATION OF THE GLOBE by Laurence Bergreen.

To be continued...

granyid

that Zaide mistaken our history he was a friar so he is bias...anyway if that the case that they have orgy in Cebu...mactan island which is nearby this cause Lapulapu to be aware...the cause of all trouble is ladies even in the beerhouse and movies too....

what <nanobrain> was discovered was a reality this is like when a salesman knocks the door to sell more...they offered ladies as part of the package and how about the court hmnnnnnnnnn....

i believe then my MSU history professor a muslim who always laugh at telling my family name means my Lola is raped by the Spanish check it out if it is true...

nice reading

BW-SugarDom
Jan-09-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: <ragdeam: <nanobrain: My point: the title of a book can make or break it.> frankly, thanks for your insights about Author <Andy's> book. I will tell him about your post. Knowing <Andy>, as a person, he would welcome those blunt insights. Pls feel free to "comment". Basta wag ka lang mag charge ng fees (ang mga abogado, charge so much).>

I don't remember where, but I read findings that those books which carry titles implying that this-and-that have worldwide or far-reaching influences [e.g., "The Idea that Changed the World", "The Battle that Changed History", "Krakatoa: The Day the Earth Shook", "How___Saved the World", etc.] usually end up selling well.

The Chinese believe that there's magic in names. One Chinese couple I know named their son "Earnswell". Now the son is a top executive in a multinational firm and is earning well.

Manny Pacquiao and Manny Villar rich. Manny sounds like <money>.

Jan-08-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: Let me begin to begin by congratulating brother <Zanshin> for winning the "Most Helpful Award" given by CG.

Let's now wait for his thank you speech ala-Famas, thanking God, his wife, his children, his BW mates, his researchers, secretary, etc. without whom the award would not have been possible, I love you! [then bow].

"Improve Your Chess at Any Age" by Andy Hortillosa.

You remember the recent film "Julie & Julia" starring Meryl Streeps as Julia Child? There was this scene there where Streeps [as J. Child] was sitting across a board where possible titles of her soon-to-be-published cookbook were written, another lady [publisher?] was discussing with her which of these titles would be best, or would help sell the book.

In Joseph Heller's novel "Portrait of the Artist as an Old Man", the protagonist Eugene Pota, who had once written a bestseller and would like to recover past glory by writing another bestseller in his old age, came up with a title to a novel which all his friends and even his publisher liked: "The Sexual Biography of My Wife". Eugene Pota's problem, however, was that he could not find a way to write the novel itself. So he had a great title but no novel. One time he proposed to his publisher: why not just sell the title? Print the cover of the book, with an attractive design for the cover, but with the pages of the book inside completely blank? They surmised, this kind of "book" would still sell, only because of its great title, but in the long run would not be a bestseller. So they dropped the idea.

My point: the title of a book can make or break it.

If you were in a chess book store and you saw the following titles:

1. Improve Your Chess at Any Age

2. Ragdeam: The Chess Psychopath

3. How Grandfathers Can Become Chess Grandmasters

4. Insanity and Chess: Are Chessplayers Insane?

5. The Life and Times of GM Bradah, the Serial Killer

which would you pick first and which would you pick last? I do not know which of these you would pick first, but I bet it's No. 1 you would pick last. Why? Because the title is bland, uninteresting, amateurish. In fact, No.3 could have been a much better improvement of No.1.

Of course, by using the phrase "At Any Age" the book perhaps hopes to target a much wider market than chessplaying grandfathers. But if you are an old chessplayer and you see this title you may also think that the book is not for you as maybe it wastes time/pages discussing how babies or toddlers can be taught chess [which you would think you know how to do already] and that's why it says "at any age". But if the title is something like "How Grandfathers Can Become Chess Masters", grandfathers will buy it and most likely even the fathers, the teenagers and the young because of the logic involved in this pretty title: if the book can help old men become masters, surely it can help also players who are not yet old enough to become grandpas.

Just my opinion. Feel free to disagree and quarrel among yourselves. Heehaw!

Jan-05-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: <pulsar: <Coelho is a goodreads member and one of my "friends"! He reads my reviews!> I have a lady friend who wrote to him one time and got a reply. :) I should read more books. I can't make a decent review of the previous books I've read but I will try to do one for the new books I've finished reading.>

It does not really have to be a review. Ubra din yung mga short comments lang. Or what you learned from the book. Or what you felt while reading it.

Jan-05-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: <ragdeam: <nanobrain: have a suggestion. Why don't you join me at www.goodreads.com? It's a site where booklovers congregate. What I do there is read a book, then I make a review of the book I've read, then send my review to my friends listed in the site.> nanobrain, thats a good idea. i will join. but do you think it would be good to join, even if the subject book is reference by nature, like this chess book by a filam? >

Since you've read BW-CG from page one to the current page you would remember that I've convincingly demonstrated here that chess is practically the same as chess.

If "Fanny Hill: Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure" [by John Cleland, the most erotic book ever written] can be reviewed at goodreads, why can't a chess book written by a Pinoy, the most erotic race in this planet?

There's no censorship or any form of limitation there, as far as I know.

Jan-05-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: <pulsar: <nanobrain> Thanks for the link, I just made an account now. I also enjoy reading and hope to rekindle the habit this year. The first book I finished for this year, by the way, is Paolo Coelho's 'The Zahir'. It was a gift from my sister and I finished it in one day because our bus got stranded somewhere near the boundary of Camarines and Quezon provinces. I'm halfway into Martin Amis' 'The House of Meetings'.>

Coelho is a goodreads member and one of my "friends"! He reads my reviews! Right now I'm also reading a Martin Amis, "Money: A Suicide Note". It's one of the 1001 books. He may be a chessplayer since on page 115 of the book he made the protagonist say:

"Each life is a game of chess that went to hell on the seventh move, and now the flukey play is cramped and slow, a dream of constraint and cross-purpose, with each move forced, all pieces pinned and skewered and zugzwanged..."

Jan-05-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: <ragdeam: <obientag: ang galing galing mo baby? <obientag:> I want you talaga the first, notice I did the second lang below you. Thanks nice guy, you get a free book. kaya lang as Andy, the author said, pls comment on it after reading it. Comment, masama o mabuti, and from there sabi niya, will feature you, in a leaf page to help sell the book.>

I have a suggestion. Why don't you join me at www.goodreads.com? It's a site where booklovers congregate. What I do there is read a book, then I make a review of the book I've read, then send my review to my friends listed in the site. Pag sila naman ang may natapos na basahin, they review also the books, then send their reviews to me. My brother is also a member there. Our common project is to read all the books listed in the "1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die". We hunt down these books and are very happy when we find one in book sales/bargains. So far, I think we have only about 25% of these books and have finished reading around 7% of these 1,001 books.

Here, obientag can review the chessbook ragdeam will give him and his review will be read by an international audience.

Dec-27-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: Tell your friend, TugasKamagong, that I'll be the first to buy his book, A Portrait of the Artist as a Mangyan once it has been published.

In Heller's book, the protagonist was named Eugene Pota. Towards the end of the book, it was revealed that he had chosen POTA because it stands for Portrait Of The Artist, POTA. In your friend's book, he can make it PUTA as Mangyans pronounce "O" like a "U".

Another writer Heller could have mentioned in his book was Stefan Zweig. This guy committed suicide WITH HIS WIFE, in Petropolis, near Rio de Janeiro, on February 23, 1942.

Stefan Zweig wrote a novel simply entitled "Chess", a copy of which I received as a gift this Christmas and which I haven't read yet. It could be an enjoyable read, however, as the blurb says:

"SOMETIMES GENIUS COMES AT A FEARFUL PRICE...

"On a cruiseship bound for Buenos Aires, a wealthy passenger challenges the world chess champion to a match. He accepts with a sneer. He will beat anyone, he says. But only if the stakes are high.

"Soon the chess board is surrounded. At first, the challenger crumbles before the mind of the master. But then, a soft-spoken voice from the crowd begins to whisper nervous suggestions.

"Perfect moves, brilliant predictions.

"The speaker has not played a game for more than twenty years, he says.

"He is wholly unknown.

"But somehow, he is also entirely formidable..."

Dec-27-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: These holidays gave me time to indulge in my first passion: reading. I've finished two books: James Joyce's "A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man", and Joseph Heller's "Portrait of an Artist, as an Old Man".

In the latter work, Heller devoted a portion on famous authors who ended up either one or a combination of being poor, bankrupt, a recluse, depressed, alcoholic or a suicide. Names like jack London, Ambrose Bierce, Bret Harte, Henry James, Joseph Conrad, Stephen Crane, Samuel Clemens [Mark Twain], Nathaniel Hawthorne, Emily Dickinson and Herman Melville were mentioned. A character in Heller's book then theorized why such literary greats ended up tragically. And when I was reading this, I thought of similar such endings among chessplayers, from Morphy down to our local hero Andronico Yap. And the passages, I thought could very well apply to chessplayers.

To be continued...

Dec-21-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: <pulsar:
I was looking at a particular game of Wesley (2008) wherein the moves were "theory" up to 20th move (or so). Is there a way to measure the retentiveness of a person's memory? I'll nominate chess GMs for the test if there is.>

Unless the player himself says so, one cannot be sure if he was really following theory. The same with "novelties". Maybe nagkataon lang that the moves he made in a particular game follows the known book moves/theory. Or he creates a "novelty" unintentionally. Kaya it's really more educational to study a game analyzed by one of the players himself. So you'll know what went on his mind as he was playing the game. A third party who analyzes a game may say things like: "The players followed the 1972 game of X vs. W up to this 20th move" my comment: how did you know the players were both aware of this 1972 game, or remembered it, or were consciously following it up to the 20th move?}; "this 1972 game continued 21.bxc6, but white here decided to deviate as he feared black must have prepared some improvement on his 21st move" [same comment, how did you know? Unless the players told you so, I would bet you were just guessing!.

Dec-04-09
Wesley So
nanobrain: Maybe, artoo, there's a video of someone dying of rabies in the internet/youtube? We can use that as an inspiration for the book.
BW-SugarDom
Feb-19-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: WANTED: second-hand books (any condition, basta complete pages). Let's negotiate the price (but must be cheaper than the regular price, otherwise what's the point?). Partial list:

AUTHOR TITLE

Achebe, Chinua Arrow of God

Acker, Kathy Blood and Guts in High School

Ackroyd, Peter Hawksmoor

Ackroyd, Peter The House of Doctor Dee

Ackroyd, Peter The Lambs of London

Ageyev, M. Novel With Cocaine

Algren, Nelson The Man With the Golden Arm

Allain, Marcel Fantômas

Amado, Jorge Tent of Miracles

Ambier, Eric Cause for Alarm

Amis, Kingsley Lucky Jim

Amis, Kingsley The Old Devils

Amis, Martin Dead Babies (1975)

Amis, Martin The Information (1995)

Andric, Ivo The Bridge on the Drina

Arbuthnot, J. Memoirs of Martinus Scriblerus

Arlen, Michael The Green Hat

Auster, Paul Moon Palace (1989)

Auster, Paul Mr. Vertigo (1994)

Auster, Paul The Music of Chance (1990)

Auster, Paul Timbuktu (1999)

Ballard, J.G. Cocaine Nights (1996)

Ballard, J.G. Crash (1973)

Ballard, J.G. Empire of the Sun (1984)

Ballard, J.G. High Rise (1975)

Ballard, J.G. Super-Cannes (2000)

Ballard, J.G. The Atrocity Exhibition (1969)

Ballard, J.G. The Drowned World (1962)

Balzac, Honore de Lost Illusions

Banks, Iain Dead Air (2002)

Banks, Iain The Crow Road (1992)

Banks, Iain The Wasp Factory (1984)

Banville, John Shroud

Banville, John The Book of Evidence

Banville, John The Newton Letter

Banville, John The Untouchable

Barbusse, Henri The Inferno

Barbusse, Henri Under Fire

Barnes, Djuna Nightwood

Barth, John Giles Goat-Boy

Barth, John The End of the Road

Barthelme, Donald Amateurs

Barthelme, Donald The Dead Father

Bartholme, Donald Come Back, Dr. Caligari

Bassani, Giorgio The Garden of the Finzi-Continis

Bataille, Georges Blue Noon

Bataille, Georges Story of the Eye

Bataille, Georges The Abbot C

Beckett, Samuel How It Is (1961)

Beckett, Samuel Malone Dies (1951)

Beckett, Samuel Mercier et Camier (1946)

Beckett, Samuel Molloy (1951)

Beckett, Samuel Murphy (1938)

Beckett, Samuel The Unnamable (1953)

Beckett, Samuel Watt (1945)

Beckett, Samuel Worstward Ho (1983)

Beckford, William Vathek

Behan, Brendan Borstal Boy

Behn, Aphra Oroonoko

Jan-30-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: Or maybe it is the ailment diagnosed by Tarrasch in his book "Die Moderne Schachpartie" called <amaurosis scachistica> [chess blindness] whose main symptom is the making of obvious but uncharacteristic blunders? Ang mahirap dito, Tarrasch said this ailment has no preventive treatment and there is some evidence daw that this may be infectious. [pero bakit hindi nahawa si Giri last game kung infectious?].
Jan-30-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: Tugas, maybe you mean the "Kotov Syndrome"? In his book Think Like a Grandmaster, A.Kotov described a process where, after a lengthy but inconclusive evaluation of likely moves the player, suddenly conscious of time passing, plays quickly, without analysis, a last-minute inspiration. This is often disastrous, but the syndrome is said to be universal.
Jan-29-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: Samakatuwid, para palang si Giri kung lumaro ako. Except that mas maaga kong nakakalimutan yung book continuation, mga around the 6th move I'm already on my own.
Jan-29-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: Parang ngayon lang ako nakakita ng ganitong petroff a. Book ba ito? Bakit di nakikipahuntahan dito si VBD?
Jan-27-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: <Pulsar: <nanobrain> Darn, you hit the jackpot with those purchases!>

Wala ng chessbooks. Inubos ko. Pero di ito magaganda. Pangit papel. If you were already alivge during Marcos time, ito yung mga librong reprinted lang ng national Bookstore and allowed via a Marcos Presidential Decree. Yung From Morphy to Fischer was sold at a 50% discount--P8.25! Alekhine Defense e P12.00; Spassky's 100 Best Games has a cover price of P14.00 but was sold at P7.00; The Treasury of Chess Lore P5.25; Indian Defenses P2,75. Walang price yung ke Fischer.

In the Spassky book, may nakasingit na index cards containing two games of Raul [most likely the previous owner, Raul Quizon] in the 5th and 9th rounds of "ITTP" [baka ito yung school sa Cubao. One was against "Benjie" and one against "Chito G." both won by Raul. Could "Chito G." be Chito Garma? Both games won by Raul.

Jan-27-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: I was jogging kanina sa UP Diliman when I saw students selling books at some tiangge at the AS Bldg.

I don't like to buy chess books anymore [which I don't read anyway] but at only <TWENTY PESOS [P20.00]> each I wasn't able to resist buying the following from the tiangge:

1. Indian Defenses by Ludek Pachman

2. My 60 Memorable Games by Bobby Fischer

3. The Treasury of Chess Lore by Fred Reinfeld

4. Spassky's 100 Best Games by Bernard Cafferty

5. From Morphy to Fischer: A History of the World Chess Championship by Al Horowitz

6. Alekhine's Defence by R.G.Eales and A.H. Williams

Except for Book No. 6, all these books have the name, address and telephone number of their previous owner:

Raul B. Quizon
225 Ermin Garcia St.
Cubao, Quezon City
Tel. 976557

All books nangingitim na sa kalumaan, and all in English notation [but who cares? As I said, di ko naman babasahin, he, he].

Jan-09-10
Eugenio Torre
nanobrain: this game is one of the 100 games featured in THE MAMMOTH BOOK OF THE WORLD'S GREATEST CHESS GAMES by graham burgess, john nunn and john emms. They say had eugene played 35...d3 the game would have drawn.
Jan-09-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: <Bradah: Waaaaah walang bibili sa serial killer book?hehe>

Personally, No.5 would be my first pick. Psychologically, there's not much difference between a chess addict and a serial killer. The only difference is the subject of their obsessions.

Jan-09-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: Between my posts kanina and my posts now, I read from page 1 up to the last the book "Silk" by Alessandro Baricco. I gave it a 5-star--the highest rating possible. To find out why, read my review of this book at www.goodreads.com.
BW-SugarDom

The last installment of Nanobrain's book adventure. Last time i heard his halfway to completing reading 1000 books before you die.

Mar-10-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: That was my latest chess-related review at goodreads.com. The book is "The Chess Artist: Genius, Obsession, and the World's Oldest Game" by J.C. Hallman
Mar-10-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: Cockily strutting about as a chess master from America, Glenn had a rude awakening when two 7-year-old chess playing Kalmyk boys beat him. As they say, Filipinos are now everywhere. And guess whom Glenn and Hallman meet while in Kalmykia? Mr. Casto Abundo, a well-known chess personality in the Philippines, described by Hallman as "a chubby Filipino" who was then in charge of FIDE's Elista branch. Abundo had a private cottage right there at the Chess City and some scenes in the book showed him watering plants in his garden and doing household chores.

Hallman was an excellent writer, very observant and he did exceptional research. Apart from the duo's adventures and misadventures, the whole history of chess is in this book: not only chess in general, but also those of EACH of the chess pieces in particular, given in-between the main narrative.

The two also visited the Marshall Chess Club and the Manhattan Chess Club with Glenn playing and Hallman observing and taking notes. With Hallman's detailed prose, the reader could nearly feel for himself the ambience in the tournament halls, have a close-up look at the quirkiness of some of the game's well-known players, and the tension felt by the players, as Glenn played at the new York Open and the World Open. To test some theories, Hallman also took Glenn to the cafeteria of the Mathematics Department of the Princeton University (birthplace of the Games Theory) to play chess, and to an American prison where Glenn played simuls with convicts and met a strong correspondence chess player named Bloodgood who was serving a life sentence for killing his own mother.

Despite this excellent product of his labor, towards the end of the book Hallman expressed his disenchantment with chess. He wrote that in learning the game's history he:

"had come to realize that a game with the potential to reconcile art and science instead frequently served as a fulcrum for ugliness. The failure of chess to popularize itself was one of the few things all chess players seemed to agree on. 'Chess should be on a higher level than any other sport,' GM Yasser Seirawan said. 'The fact that it's on such a low scale is a collective failure.' As long as chess has existed, great thinkers have found it distasteful. 'I hate and avoid it, because it is not play enough,' said Montaigne. 'The struggle for power and the competitive spirit expressed in the from of an ingenious game (has) always been repugnant to me,' said Einstein. The list of actual players who have abandoned the game or come to dislike it while continuing in the profession is long and full of talent."

Hallman also implied that he sees Glenn's future as a chess player as rather bleak--

"The worldwide structure of tournament play, the entire existence of FIDE and Ilyumzhinov and other chess organizations, it was all designed for one thing--to create a patriarchal pseudogovernment whose only purpose was to perpetuate itself. Chess was like an aircraft carrier forever at sea,, at war with the world and always on the brink of mutiny. Even its first world champion had suggested the world might be better off without it. It was virtually impossible for a player of Glenn's caliber to feel as though he had accomplished anything. As a black man, Glenn had achieved what only a few dozen black men had done before him, ever, and though chess was his identity wholesale he was forced to think of it as a glorified hobby."

But whatever. That took nothing away from my enjoyment of the book, for if reading is my wife then chess is my mistress. This book was well-written, informative and fun, fun, fun. A strong five-star book in my growing library, hardbound, and only P165.00 at Booksale SM Megamall. Viva Booksale!

Mar-10-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: This book has all a chess player would want: chess lore, quotes, personalities, history and travel to places of interest to chess players. There are even three annotated games, two of them are part of the main story and played by Glenn, one of the two principal protagonists.

It was at a casino in Atlantic City where the author J.C. Hallman, who worked there as a casino dealer, met Glenn Umstead, a USCF-rated 2173 chess player whose rating at the Internet Chess Club once reached as high as 2561. Glenn is an African-American who had the ambition to become the first black chess grandmaster, only to see his hopes dashed to the ground when Maurice Ashley (a black American) beat him into it.

Glenn is a prototype of a real chess nut. He lives and breathes chess. He plays whenever and wherever there is opportunity to play. He becomes morose and lethargic if deprived of chess for two or more days. He had been once married and has a child, but the marriage lasted for only a few months. His relationships with past girlfriends also did not last long, some of them complaining he plays too much chess. At 28 years old, he has never owned a car. He would play chess in the internet up to the wee hours of the morning and sleep during his commute to work. He works as a card dealer at the casino to earn a living but all the rest is basically chess already.

When Hallman invited Glenn to a chess adventure, Glenn wasted no time in accepting. Their travel took them to Moscow and to St. Petersburg in Russia where they visited chess clubs (which were "like brothels" according to Hallman) and where Glenn played 3-minute blitz games (with $2 bet per game) against the legendary Chepukaitis, 5-time blitz champion of St. Petersburg, and who once played blitz with the teenage Bobby Fischer and beat the latter ten games in a row. Glenn lost horribly to Chepukaitis, 9 1/2 to 1 1/2.

They also flew to, and spent several weeks in, Elista. This is the capital city of the former Soviet republic of Kalmykia, where its crazed President Kirsan Ilyumzhinov built a Chess City amidst the squalor and poverty of the country. Hallman wrangled an interview with Kirsan and the latter, who at that time was also the President of the FIDE (the world governing body for chess), minced no words in saying that one of his goals is to make chess the religion for his country. He considered the equally-psychotic American champion Bobby Fischer a god.

Feb-19-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: <wordfunph: <<Wordfun>, utang na loob! He, he.> atty <nano>, i can't promise but i will do my best. ipapa print ko titles you posted then give a copy to my friend who is working in Book Sale. Teks teks na lang..>

To me and my brother heaven would be like living inside the Booksale's main warehouse where we have the first pick of their books as soon as they arrive from abroad.

when we retire, we even dream of working as librarians just so we can have peace and quiet all day and read.

Feb-19-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: <mysql>, asamateroffuc I'm reading now a sci-fi book which is included sa 1001 books. THE PLAYER OF GAMES ni Iain M. Banks. Magandang basahin ito ng mga kakosa natin dito kasi malalaman nyo dito how games(including board games like chess) would be played in the future when we can already travel in far galaxies and get in contact with alien civilisations. 405 pages yung book, nasa page 225 na ako before I started kibitzing here again (see what i mean? chess is really a time-killer. I started kibitzing mga 2 hours ago siguro!).
Feb-19-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: Another example [maybe it will help decode whatever secrets this book has):

"Ther frequented to his lodging, as well the Spider to @#$%e poyfon of his fine wit, as the Bee to gather Hunny: as well the Drone as the Doue: the Foxe as the Lambe: as wel Damocles to betray him, as Damon to be true to him."

Did the editors of the 1001 books include this as the final INSURMOUNTABLE hurdle so that no one can ever finish all the 1001 books and will have to stop at the 1000th book?

Feb-19-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: I need also the opinion of the scholars here, <winter>, <tugaskamagong>, <artoo> and the russian linguistic expert <iskubadayb>.

One of the 1001 books is John Lyly's "Euphues: The Anatomy of Wit". I got a copy at the Bookay Ukay bookstore (sells only 2nd hand books) for only P80.00. It's a hardbound 1895 edition (brittle na mga pages), altho the book itself was first published in 1579.

My question is: why is the book like this? Let me quote, verbatim, its second sentence of its first chapter and you will get an idea of how difficult it is for me to read the entire book:

"But Nature impatient of comparifons, and as it were difdaining a companion or copartner in hir working, added to this comelyneffe of his bodye fuch a fharpe capacity of minde, that not onely fhe proued Fortune counterfaite, but was halfe of that opinion that fhe hir felfe was onely currant."

Did i buy a misprinted book, or is this really the english in 1579? If so, how can I understand this?

Feb-19-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: Pre, Emilie Zola ata author. Drunkard yung book. Please exclude from the list: THE BREAST by Roth, COLD COMFORT FARM by Gibbons, HOW LATE IT WAS, HOW LATE by Kelman, DUSKLANDS by Coetzee. My brother just texted, he got copies na just a minute ago.
Feb-19-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: cont.

MacInnes, Colin Absolute Beginners

Mackenzie, Henry The Man of Feeling

MacPherson, Ian Wild Harbour

Mann, Heinrich Professor Unrat

Manning, Frederic Her Privates We

Mansfield, Katherine The Garden Party

Marias, Javier A Heart So White

Markson, David Vanishing Point

Markson, David Wittgenstein’s Mistress

Mason, Peter Adjunct: An Undigest

Mathews, Harry Cigarettes

Maturin, Charles Robert Melmoth the Wanderer

Maturin, Charles Robert The Albigenses

Maugham, William Somerset The Razor’s Edge

Maupassant, Guy de A Woman’s Life

Maupassant, Guy de Bel-Ami

Maupassant, Guy de Pierre and Jean

Mazzantini, Margaret Don’t Move

McCabe, Patrick The Butcher Boy

McCoy, Horace They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?

McEwan, Ian Black Dogs (1992)

McGahern, John Amongst Women

McGahern, John That They May Face the Rising Sun

McGowan, Heather Schooling

Mda, Zakes The Heart of Redness

Michaels, Anne Fugitive Pieces

Miller, Henry Tropic of Capricorn

Mishima, Yukio The Sea of Fertility Tetralogy (Book 1: Spring of Snow; Book 3: The Temple of Dawn ; Book 4: The Decay of the Angel)

Mishra, Pankaj The Romantics

Mistry, Rohinton Family Matters

Moore, Alan Watchmen

Moore, Lorrie Anagrams

Moore, Lorrie Like Life

Moravia, Alberto A Ghost at Noon

Moravia, Alberto Disobedience

Moravia, Alberto The Time of Indifference

Morris, William News from Nowhere

Mulisch, Harry The Discovery of Heaven

Multatuli Max Havelaar

Murdoch, Iris The Bell

Murdoch, Iris The Nice and the Good

Murdoch, Iris Under the Net

Musil, Robert The Man Without Qualities

Nabokov, Vladimir Pnin

Naipaul, V.S. A Bend in the River

Naipaul, V.S. Enigma of Arrival

Nashe, Thomas The Unfortunate Traveller

Nooteboom, Cees All Souls Day

Nooteboom, Cees Rituals

Nothomb, Amelie Fear and Trembling

Oates, Joyce Carol Black Water

Oates, Joyce Carol Blonde

Oates, Joyce Carol Marya

O'Brien, Edna Girl With Green Eyes

O'Brien, Edna In the Forest

O'Brien, Edna The Country Girls

O'Brien, Flann At Swim-Two-Birds

O'Brien, Flann The Poor Mouth

Oe, Kenzaburo Pluck the Bud and Destroy the Offspring

O'Hanlon, Ardal The Talk of the Town

O'Neill, Jamie At Swim

Orwell, George Coming Up for Air

Feb-19-10
Wesley So
nanobrain: Haasse, Hella Forever a Stranger

Haggard, H. Rider King Solomon’s Mines

Hall, Radclyffe The Well of Loneliness

Hamilton, Patrick Hangover Square

Hammett, Dashiell The Glass Key

Himes, Chester Blind Man With a Pistol

Hodgson, William Hope The House on the Borderland

Hofmann, Gert The Parable of the Blind

Hogg, James The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner

Holderlin, Friedrich Hyperion

Hollinghurst, Alan The Folding Star

Hollinghurst, Alan The Swimming-Pool Library

Houellebecq, Michael Platform

Houellebecq, Michel Elementary Particles

Houellebecq, Michel Whatever

Huysmans, Joris-Karl Against the Grain

Ishiguro, Kazuo A Pale View of Hills

Ishiguro, Kazuo An Artist of the Floating World

James, Henry The Golden Bowl

James, Henry The Wings of the Dove

Jameson, Storm A Day Off

Jansson, Tove The Summer Book

Johnson, B.S. Albert Angelo

Johnson, B.S. House Mother Normal

Johnson, B.S. Trawl

Johnson, Uwe Jahrestage

Jones, David In Parenthesis

Joyce, James Finnegans Wake

Jung-rae, Jo The Taebek Mountains

Kadare, Ismail Broken April

Kadare, Ismail Spring Flowers, Spring Frost

Kafka, Franz Amerika

Kafka, Franz The Castle

Kelman, James A Disaffection

Kelman, James The Bus Conductor Hines

Kennedy, A.L. Everything You Need

Kennedy, A.L. Looking for the Possible Dance

Kertesz, Imre Fateless

Kesey, Ken Sometimes a Great Notion

Kingsley, Charles The Water-Babies

Kotzwinkle, William The Fan Man

Kotzwinkle, William The Midnight Examiner

Krasznahorkai, Laszlo The Melancholy of Resistance

Kraus, Karl The Last Days of Humanity

Kundera, Milan Ignorance

Kundera, Milan The Book of Laughter and Forgetting

Kureishi, Hanif Gabriel’s Gift

Kureishi, Hanif Intimacy

Kureishi, Hanif The Buddha of Suburbia

Kyong-ni, Park Land

Lagerlof, Selma Gösta Berling’s Saga

Larsen, Nella Passing

Larsen, Nella Quicksand

Lautreaumont, Comte de Maldoror

Lavergne, Marie-Madelaine Pioche de The Princess of Clèves

Laxness, Halldor Independent People

Leavitt, David Lost Language of Cranes

Lem, Stanislaw Solaris

Lenz, Siegfried The German Lesson

Leonard, Elmore City Primeval (1980)

Leonard, Elmore La Brava (1983)

Leskov, Nicolai The Enchanted Wanderer

Lessing, Doris The Diary of Jane Somers

Lessing, Doris The Grass is Singing

Levi, Primo If Not Now, When?

Levi, Primo If This Is a Man

Lewis, M.G. The Monk

Lewis, Wyndham Self Condemned

Lewis, Wyndham Tarr

Lewis, Wyndham The Apes of God

Lewis, Wyndham The Childermass

Lewis, Wyndham The Revenge for Love

Lispector, Clarice The Hour of the Star

Lispector, Clarice The Passion According to G.H.

Llosa, Mario Vargas The Cubs and Other Stories

London, Jack Martin Eden

London, Jack The Iron Heel

Lovecraft, H.P. At the Mountains of Madness

Lowry, Malcolm Dark as the Grave Wherein My Friend is Laid

bw-pulsar

If you guys want I can copy here nano's book reviews at goodreads. With his permission, of course. :)

BW-SugarDom

That'll be great PUlsar.

bw-pulsar

One of nanobrain's reviews at www.goodreads.com:

 

 

Chess Story (New York Review Books Classics) 
by Stefan Zweig 

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Nophoto-u-50x66
Joselito's review
rating: 5 of 5 stars
status: Read in April, 2010

Mirko Czentovic, at age 20, is the world chess champion. He had humble beginnings, an orphan who was cared for by a priest after his impoverished father, a boatman, died in an accident. At an early age he had shown signs of stupidity. He failed at school, couldn't write sentences in any language without committing mistakes and spoke very little. Then, by accident, his talent for chess was discovered. 

Even when he was already world champion his character remained the same. He was still the same "complete stranger to the world of the mind, a stolid, taciturn, rustic youth from whom even the wiliest of journalists never succeeded in coaxing a single word that was the least use for publicity purposes." But the novel's narrator, a passenger in a cruiseship bound for Buenos Aires where Mirko Czentovic was also aboard on his way to play at some tournaments in Argentina, still found the latter interesting as he: 

"has always been interested in any kind of monomaniac obsessed by a single idea, for the more a man restricts himself the closer he is, conversely, to infinity; characters like this, apparently remote from reality, are like termites using their own material to build a remarkable and unique small-scale version of the world." 

During the trip a wealthy passenger manages to persuade the reclusive chess champion to play against him (for a fee of $250 per game). The first game was easily won by Mirko Czentovic. During the second game, a stranger named Dr. B whispered suggested moves and strategies to the businessman, after preventing him from committing a blunder he was about to make, and this led to the game being drawn. This man said he hasn't played chess for more than 20 years. Mirko Czentovic, correctly sensing that this man was the one who thought of those strong saving moves which drew the second game, challenged him (and anybody interested) to a match the next day. 

Before the next match, Dr. B told the narrator that he will accept the challenge to play only on condition that it will only be for one game. Then he told the story of how he came to play good chess. I leave something here now for future readers of this novel but suffice it to say here that Dr. B's story is itself interesting but its meaning only came out the next day when he was playing already their second game, after beating the chess champion in their first game. 
The author, with this ending, was in his elements as he definitely knew what he was writing about. By the time this book was published in 1944, he and his wife had been dead, having committed double suicide in Petropolis, near Rio de Janeiro, on 23 February 1942. This, after rhetorically asking in this book: 

"Is (chess) not also a science and an art, hovering between those categories as Muhammad's coffin hovered between heaven and earth, a unique link between pairs of opposites: ancient yet eternally new; mechanical in structure, yet made effective only by the imagination; limited to a geometrically fixed space, yet with unlimited combinations; constantly developing, yet sterile; thought that leads nowhere; mathematics calculating nothing; art without works of art; architecture without substance--but nonetheless shown to be more durable in its entity and existence than all the books and works of art; the only game that belongs to all nations and all eras, although no one knows what god brought it down to earth to vanquish boredom, sharpen the senses and stretch the mind. Where does it begin and where does it end? Every child can learn its basic rules, every bungler can try his luck at it, yet within that immutable little square it is able to bring forth a particular species of masters who cannot be compared to anyone else, people with a gift solely designed for chess, geniuses in their specific field who unite vision, patience and technique in just the same proportions as do mathematicians, poets, musicians, but in different stratifications and combinations. In the old days of the enthusiasm for physiognomy, a physician like Gall might perhaps have dissected a chess champion's brain to find out whether some particular twist or turn in the grey matter, a kind of chess muscle or chess bump, is more developed in such chess geniuses than in the skulls of other mortals. And how intrigued such a physiognomist would have been by the case of Czentovic, where that specific genius appeared in a setting of absolute intellectual lethargy, like a single vein of gold in a hundredweight of dull stone. In principle, I had always realized that such a unique, brilliant game must create its own matadors, but how difficult and indeed impossible it is to imagine the life of an intellectually active human being whose world is reduced entirely to the narrow one-way traffic between black and white, who seeks the triumphs of his life in the mere movement to and fro, forward and back of thirty-two chessmen, someone to whom a new opening, moving knight rather than pawn, is a great deed, and his little corner of immortality is tucked away in a book about chess--a human being, an intellectual human being who constantly bends the entire force of his mind on the ridiculous task of forcing a wooden king into the corner of a wooden board, and does it without going mad!" 

Touche! I'm so glad this novel has been included in the latest updated list of the 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die!(less)
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bw-pulsar

The Chess Artist: Genius, Obsession, and the World's Oldest Game 
by J.C. Hallman 

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Nophoto-u-50x66
Joselito's review
rating: 5 of 5 stars
status: Read in February, 2010

This book has all a chess player would want: chess lore, quotes, personalities, history and travel to places of interest to chess players. There are even three annotated games, two of them are part of the main story and played by Glenn, one of the two principal protagonists. 

It was at a casino in Atlantic City where the author J.C. Hallman, who worked there as a casino dealer, met Glenn Umstead, a USCF-rated 2173 chess player whose rating at the Internet Chess Club once reached as high as 2561. Glenn is an African-American who had the ambition to become the first black chess grandmaster, only to see his hopes dashed to the ground when Maurice Ashley (a black American) beat him into it. 

Glenn is a prototype of a real chess nut. He lives and breathes chess. He plays whenever and wherever there is opportunity to play. He becomes morose and lethargic if deprived of chess for two or more days. He had been once married and has a child, but the marriage lasted for only a few months. His relationships with past girlfriends also did not last long, some of them complaining he plays too much chess. At 28 years old, he has never owned a car. He would play chess in the internet up to the wee hours of the morning and sleep during his commute to work. He works as a card dealer at the casino to earn a living but all the rest is basically chess already. 

When Hallman invited Glenn to a chess adventure, Glenn wasted no time in accepting. Their travel took them to Moscow and to St. Petersburg in Russia where they visited chess clubs (which were "like brothels" according to Hallman) and where Glenn played 3-minute blitz games (with $2 bet per game) against the legendary Chepukaitis, 5-time blitz champion of St. Petersburg, and who once played blitz with the teenage Bobby Fischer and beat the latter ten games in a row. Glenn lost horribly to Chepukaitis, 9 1/2 to 1 1/2. 

They also flew to, and spent several weeks in, Elista. This is the capital city of the former Soviet republic of Kalmykia, where its crazed President Kirsan Ilyumzhinov built a Chess City amidst the squalor and poverty of the country. Hallman wrangled an interview with Kirsan and the latter, who at that time was also the President of the FIDE (the world governing body for chess), minced no words in saying that one of his goals is to make chess the religion for his country. He considered the equally-psychotic American champion Bobby Fischer a god. 

Cockily strutting about as a chess master from America, Glenn had a rude awakening when two 7-year-old chess playing Kalmyk boys beat him. As they say, Filipinos are now everywhere. And guess whom Glenn and Hallman meet while in Kalmykia? Mr. Casto Abundo, a well-known chess personality in the Philippines, described by Hallman as "a chubby Filipino" who was then in charge of FIDE's Elista branch. Abundo had a private cottage right there at the Chess City and some scenes in the book showed him watering plants in his garden and doing household chores. 

Hallman was an excellent writer, very observant and he did exceptional research. Apart from the duo's adventures and misadventures, the whole history of chess is in this book: not only chess in general, but also those of EACH of the chess pieces in particular, given in-between the main narrative. 

The two also visited the Marshall Chess Club and the Manhattan Chess Club with Glenn playing and Hallman observing and taking notes. With Hallman's detailed prose, the reader could nearly feel for himself the ambience in the tournament halls, have a close-up look at the quirkiness of some of the game's well-known players, and the tension felt by the players, as Glenn played at the new York Open and the World Open. To test some theories, Hallman also took Glenn to the cafeteria of the Mathematics Department of the Princeton University (birthplace of the Games Theory) to play chess, and to an American prison where Glenn played simuls with convicts and met a strong correspondence chess player named Bloodgood who was serving a life sentence for killing his own mother. 

Despite this excellent product of his labor, towards the end of the book Hallman expressed his disenchantment with chess. He wrote that in learning the game's history he: 

"had come to realize that a game with the potential to reconcile art and science instead frequently served as a fulcrum for ugliness. The failure of chess to popularize itself was one of the few things all chess players seemed to agree on. 'Chess should be on a higher level than any other sport,' GM Yasser Seirawan said. 'The fact that it's on such a low scale is a collective failure.' As long as chess has existed, great thinkers have found it distasteful. 'I hate and avoid it, because it is not play enough,' said Montaigne. 'The struggle for power and the competitive spirit expressed in the from of an ingenious game (has) always been repugnant to me,' said Einstein. The list of actual players who have abandoned the game or come to dislike it while continuing in the profession is long and full of talent." 

Hallman also implied that he sees Glenn's future as a chess player as rather bleak-- 

"The worldwide structure of tournament play, the entire existence of FIDE and Ilyumzhinov and other chess organizations, it was all designed for one thing--to create a patriarchal pseudogovernment whose only purpose was to perpetuate itself. Chess was like an aircraft carrier forever at sea,, at war with the world and always on the brink of mutiny. Even its first world champion had suggested the world might be better off without it. It was virtually impossible for a player of Glenn's caliber to feel as though he had accomplished anything. As a black man, Glenn had achieved what only a few dozen black men had done before him, ever, and though chess was his identity wholesale he was forced to think of it as a glorified hobby." 

But whatever. That took nothing away from my enjoyment of the book, for if reading is my wife then chess is my mistress. This book was well-written, informative and fun, fun, fun. A strong five-star book in my growing library, hardbound, and only P165.00 at Booksale SM Megamall. Viva Booksale!(less)
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BW-SugarDom

Nanobrain is a literary genius.

bw-pulsar
April 16
Rameau's Nephew and... Joselito gave 3 of 5 stars to: 
Rameau's Nephew and First Satire (ebook) 
by Denis Diderot
read in April, 2010 
my rating:
didn't like itit was okliked itreally liked itit was amazing 
 

JoselitoJoselito said: Before I became a regular here at goodreads.com I used to while away my internet hours at chessgames.com. There, we discussed, watched and analyzed great chess games, some of them even while being played live in different parts of the world. But as in other social sites conversations among kibitzers were inevitable. And this was where the arresting beauty of chess was, to me, somehow neutralized: when the chess players began to talk (electronically). 

I had thought this is a new phenomenon in this age of internet chess but I was mistaken. I had realized that in the mid-eighteenth-century in Paris, France, cafes abounded where people also played chess and talked. 

The setting of this book is one such cafe. It is actually one long conversation between "ME" (presumably the author) and "HIM" (Rameau"s nephew. Rameau is supposed to be a famous musician; the nephew is an eccentric scoundrel, a vagabond whose "concepts of honour and dishonour are strangely jumbled in his head, for he makes no parade of the good qualities which nature has given him, and, for the bad, evinces no shame"). The conversation happened one evening amidst chess games being played. The book reminded me of chessgames.com because it began this way: 

"RAIN or shine, it's my habit, about five of an evening, to go for a stroll in the Palais-Royal. It's me you see there, invariably alone, sitting on the d'Argenson bench, musing. I converse with myself about politics, love, taste, or philosophy. I give my mind licence to wander wherever it fancies. I leave it completely free to pursue the first wise or foolish idea that it encounters, just as, on the Allee de Foy, you see our young rakes pursuing a flighty, smiling, sharp-eyed, snub-nosed little tart, abandoning this one to follow that one, trying them all but not settling on any. In my case, my thoughts are my little flirts. If the weather's too cold, or too wet, I take refuge in the Cafe de la Regence, where I pass the time watching the games of chess. Of all the cities in the world, it's Paris, and of all the places in Paris, it's the Cafe de la Regence, where chess is played best. Rey's cafe is the arena where the astute Legal, the subtle Philidor, the dependable Mayot mount their attacks; it's there you witness the most astonishing moves and that you hear the most stupid conversation; for if one may be both a wit and a fine chess player like Legal, one may also be a fine chess player and an idiot like Foubert and Mayot...." 

Chessgames.com is also where you can witness the most astonishing chess moves and hear the most stupid conversation. 

Anyway, it was while watching the chess games at Cafe de la Regence that "HIM" accosted "ME" for a talk, the former jestingly addressing the latter as the "Master Philosopher". "ME" obliges "HIM" because even if he holds people like "HIM" in low esteem, once in a while "ME"-- 

"like(s) to stop and spend time with them, because their character contrasts sharply with other men's, and they break with that tedious uniformity which our education, our social conventions, and our customary proprieties have produced." 

So they conversed, talking about almost all topics concerning man and the human condition and, if you would not be vexed by the need to consult the footnotes located somewhere near the end of the book which explain people and events during those times referred to by "ME" and "HIM" during their talk, you would actually enjoy quotable quotes from this rascal "HIM" like : 

"Vice itself is only intermittently shocking. The appearance of vice is shocking at all times. Perhaps it would be better to be an arrogant fellow than to look like one; the man with an arrogant character offends only from time to time; the man with the arrogant face offends all the time." 

Towards the end, however, "ME" would have a much kinder perception of "HIM". He ("ME") said: 

"There was, in what he ("HIM") was saying, much that we all think, and by which we guide our behaviour, but do not actually say. In truth, this was the most striking difference between my man and the majority of other people. He admitted to the vices that he, in common with others, had; but he was not a hypocrite. He was neither more nor less odious than they were, he was simply franker, more consistent, and occasionally profound in his depravity."
BW-SugarDom

1000 booksto read before you die.

I'm going to real all Michael Crichton's books before he dies.

I'm finish with Jurassic Park and Adromeda Strain. I'm onto "Air Frame"

mysql
BW-SugarDom wrote:

1000 booksto read before you die.

I'm going to real all Michael Crichton's books before he dies.

I'm finish with Jurassic Park and Adromeda Strain. I'm onto "Air Frame"


Isn't Michael Crichton dead already? Try to read his book entitled "Travels". It's about his life experiences.

http://www.michaelcrichton.net/books-travels.html

BW-SugarDom

Embarassed hehe...better he than me...

myown

why is chess mentioned in so many non-chess books but there's nothing of that sort in songs? I don't even know one song which mentions chess even in passing...