Morphy the Terrible

That's me :D

No one plays chess purely based on theoretical knowledge. Chess is an intuitive game. We can sense "good" and "bad" positions. Why would a player in the 19th century have trouble with this?  We may improve due to new ideas, but those new ideas come from innovative players.

Steinitz lived in an Era of attacking chess, yet he placed emphais on defense.

The "spirit of the age" argument is faulty. If that was the case, chess would remain the same.

Someone eventually has to think outside the box. 

If anyone wants to know the truth, I checked some of Morphy's game in a computer and he made the top moves as affirmed by the computer.

I was waiting for this conversation to be revived.

Mihail Marin pointed out that Paul Morphy did not actually revolutionize chess thinking. He was a very concrete and efficient calculator who loved to attack. But his rival Adolph Anderssen actually was a more comprehensive player. When Anderssen finally realised he couldn't beat Morphy through brute strength calculation, he started to play more closed positions and scored much better against him.

I would love to have seen a rematch between Morphy and Anderssen where Anderssen used his knowledge from the first match. Morphy may still have won, but it would have been much closer.

For those who are interested in this modern perspective, check out Mihail Marin's Secrets of Attacking Chess.His argument for a reassessment of Morphy may well upset batgirl, but it is based on both Morphy's games and Anderssen's evaluations at the time.

Karpov, in his new book, Find the Right Plan (2010), has nothing but good things to say about Morphy, and cites Botvinnik to this end.

Morphy set the standard for open games.  Anderssen was well advised to (later on) play away from Morphy's strength.  Anderssen's later results bear this out.

Thanks for the great post!  I have been working on a blog about Morphy on and off for the last few days.  I live around the area where he lived and taught a class during the Summer where he went to college. I have been fasinated by Paul morphy for years.

That's highly inaccurate.

Anderssen won their first game as Black in the Evans Gambit, a very open game and drew the second game in an open variation of the Ruy Lopez. After losing the next 3 games, Anderssen resorted to an irregular opening 1.a3 and again lost to Morphy. It was an opened, not closed game. The next game, Anderssen played the center-counter defense, another open game (and lost), then on game 8 again employed 1.a3 and drew. It was again an open game. In game 9 as Black, Anderssen tried a Sicilian Defence and lost in 17 moves.  Game 10, as White, Anderssen again played 1.a3 and won. It was another open game. In the 11th and final game, Anderssen did , in fact, play a closed game, the French Defense, an lost. 

So, out of 11 games, only 1 game was closed and Anderssen lost it. Anderssen won games 1 and 10 and drew games  2 and 8, so the entire premise above makes no sense.

There actually was a rematch of sorts... the day after the conclusion to the match.  Morphy and Anderssen played 6 skittle games out of which Morphy won 5, Anderssen won 1.  Anderssen's only win was a quite open game, a KGA.

Ok, now we're talking chess, and not hagiographies.

1.a3 e5 2.c4 is NOT an open game. It's a closed game.  When Anderssen played 1.a3, he scored 50% against Morphy. Marin analysed his loss to Morphy in the book I mentioned. This book has been mentioned by others in other threads that you have posted in.

While you may claim it is highly inaccurate, Mihail Marin disagrees with you. And he bases his argument on the chess that was played.

Here is the game that Anderssen won using 1.a3. I strongly recommend the Marin book to anyone who wants to see an in-depth analysis of the game he lost playing 1.a3 against Morphy.

Anderssen really to had to work hard for that win.

Morphy obviously wanted to crash through on the King side.  That game (probably) lasted twice as long as most Morphy games.  Thanks for the post, @SmyslovFan.

Sounds like Anderssen and Morphy didn't play many games, en toto.  Unlike the Karpov-Kasparov rivalry of years ago.

Just to be absolutely clear: While I disagree with batgirl, I respect her love and knowledge of Morphy and his games.  I agree that Morphy was the best player of his day. But yes, I do disagree with her about how well-rounded he was and about just how much he really contributed to the game.

Yeah, and let's not forget he had "preternaturally small hands", or something!

I remember as a teenager, finding the following magazine, at the chess club. The hand shown is supposed to be a death cast and shown life-size. I was astounded at the smallness of Morphy's hand.

I like how Anderssen traded down pieces while black was attacking and had a space advantage.  Also, the reversed Paulsen position that resulted is interesting =)

Well, I usually consider closed games those in which the center, the e and d files, is locked. When flank files are involved, I'm not so sure since the center itself is still mobile.  Let's take for granted that a closed position is one that involves at least one locked center pawn, the argument that Anderssen started playing closed games after being bested in open ones and improved his score isn't at all the case.  If, for the sake of argument, we agree that Anderssen's Opening is a closed game and that the French Defense is a closed game, we can look at the results:

I think you might not understand my view of Morphy.  I agree with assessors such as Valeri Beim and Marin (I'd never read Marin's book, but did read a series of articles by Marin on Morphy about 15 years ago). Morphy was no innovator. Even the Morphy Defense wasn't an innovation.  Players understood development and defense long before Morphy came into the picture.  Morphy, however, was an artist with vast creative ideas (his creative side cost him several games, giving simple up mundane wins for combinative inspirations - his game vs Bird, the prime example) and a deep and accurate calculator. But beyond that, as Lasker noted, Morphy was a fighter without match. Again this trait also cost him some games where he tried for wins in drawish positions. Morphy was also less inventive in closed position, but not, I feel, because he was actually incapable, but rather that he felt, as the true Romantic player that he was, such games were an affront to chess and tried to manipulate them into something more to his liking, sometimes succeeding, sometimes not. 

I have changed my assesment of Morphy. I was thinking of him from an all-enconmpassing perspective. 

Of course he's not better than Steinitz or Lasker. They lived in different periods.

I still think that Morphy would have had trouble against Staunton.

People seem to forget his brilliancy.

I just think that Morphy's aggresiveness would not have worked against a solid player like Staunton.

Unlike most of the Romantics, he understood defense.

The comments are by Raymond Kenee.

That game is full of mistakes....

Morphy, in consultation, beat Staunton, in consultation, twice, once as White, once as Black...

Batgirl, have you ever played a consultation game?  Even though Morphy and Staunton were clearly the two stronger players, consultation chess is so different from a regular game that it's hard to draw conclusions on how the two would really have done one-on-one.

But again, Morphy's concrete efficiency makes me think he was the best player of his generation. He wasn't as far ahead of Anderssen and Staunton as some hagiographies would have us believe though.