I am so thankful to Fred Reinfeld, some of his books help me get to expert level, especially his tactics books and I love his books on the three masters he wrote about and their game collection, Nimzovitch, Capablanca and Tarrasch, and wonderful annotation.
I gained a lot from the Tarrasch book. I thought it was very good.
Chess In A Nutshell is a book for those who know nothing about the game; it's like saying once you reach a certain level of proficiency, it's time to review the absolute basics. The comment to Ziggy was for Reinfeld's ideas on development; Knights should go here, Bishops here, Rooks here, etc. OK?
My advice to relative beginners...say those under 1600 USCF and struggling: LESS Nimzovich, MORE Reinfeld!
Reinfeld died when my mother was a little girl so obviously I never met him. But he strikes me as having been a man whose motto is "time is money." Horowitz strikes me the same way, but Horowitz was an extrovert and Reinfeld was an introvert.
You bring up an interesting thing. Professional chess players are ultimately just that, chess players and their goal is to play chess. Some give simuls to make a little extra cash. This allows amateurs the opportunity to test their mettle against these larger-than-life players and maybe even win. But does a player, simply by virtue of interacting with the public, something for which both are compensated in different ways, owe the public anything else such as encouragement, compliments, even a smile or are they just lagniappes thrown in according to the players' personalities?
I would think that as an author it makes good business sense to be nice to your readers/customers especially if all it costs are a few kind words at the end of a game.
I agree. It makes practical sense. Some literary names are disdainful of their readers and even some sports figures and musicians are rude to their loyal fans. I guess, in the end, not everyone is practical.
I still have a few of his books. They're so old that they're in pieces, but still readable. I loved his work when I was just starting tournament play and it still holds a good amount of nostalgia for me
When I was learning how to play chess in the late 1960s, Fred Reinfeld and I.A. Horowitz were some of my favorite authors to read. I especially enjoyed Reinfeld's "The Complete Chess Companion" and Horowitz's "How to Win In the Chess Openings". They, also with a few other of their books, helped me improve very much in chess. I was able to beat anyone, adult or classmate, in the local area during my high school years during the 1970s.
I learned the moves from my father at an early age in the 1960s, and wanted to get better and better. All that was available for sale in the suburbs were Reinfeld, Horowitz and Chernev books. I bought them all. I wish I could wax nostalgic with the rest of you, but frankly, they are horrible compared to the current era's beginner books by Pandolfini, Heisman, Seirawan, et al.
Now tactics being tactics, Reinfeld's "1001 Sacs/Combinations", "1001 Checkmates" and his "Winning Chess" co-authored with Chernev. were still very useful. But so much of the other works were not very helpful to this very eager young student. The best I can say is that they were better than nothing.
When I was a scholastic player in the late 1960s, the highest rated high school player in Massachusetts was Jackie Peters, who was only a 1700 player when he graduated. He went on to become an IM and a near-GM, but I am sure he would have become a world class player if he had been born just a few years later and had better chess literature in his schoolboy days.
I came across this interesting 1991 interview given by Anatoly Karpov of which this is an excerpt:
"I think the quality of chess books was much better in former times. They were also more serious. These authors felt a greater responsibility than out present-day authors. Probably they ad less to do, less to play, but I still like the books of Alekhine, Capablanca, Lasker and Tarrasch. I followed their examples (in his own books). Not only to give variations, but to explain some ideas.
To understand variations you have to be alreadyquite a strong player, but in words a chess author cha explain many more things. I like the psychological way of annotating games of Lasker. I like the variations of Alekhine. He was one of the best annotators. Capablanca had his own style which I also appreciate very much. And I like the humor of Tarrasch."
@batgirl There have always been good chessbooks available for good players, but only since Fischer's 1972 championship, and his raising chess awarness in the West, have there been a lot of good books for beginning players. I didn't even come across Lasker's "Manual of Chess," until Dover did a reprint in the wake of the Fischer boom. Same with "My System," which was reissued by McKay.
I've read a few Reinfeld books. He is the one who came up with the piece values Q = 9, R =5, B = N = 3, P = 1.
In the '90's, Larry Kaufman published a celebrated study of 80,000,000 positions and deduced Q = 9.75, R = 5, B = N = 3.25, P = 1, which many experts today feel is a better average set of values.
For example, Reinfeld would find the common exchange of B + N for the P and castled R at f2 or f7 to be an equal trade but Kaufman's values show that the B + N are worth half a pawn more than the R + P, and that exchange is generally seen as foolish for the B + N owner.
Piece value is anything but absolute so whatever value system you chose to follow, it will be wrong some of the time, maybe even most of the time. There are times when a pawn is worth more than a Rook or when a Knight is worth more than Bishop or two connected passed pawns are worth the game. The values of pieces are subjective to the position on the board. So it's a guide and one that can lead you astray as well as steer you in the right direction.
The earliest I can see Reinfeld endorsing the 1-3-5-9 system, which he absolutely does, is in his 1953 "The Complete Chess Player." But this particular valuation system was offered long before then, so the connection between that system and his name is arbitrary.
I was thinking this might be a worthwhile subject to study, but it seems to have been over-studied already.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_piece_relative_value is pretty comprehensive.
I've been looking at how piece value was determined in the 19th century and before. There are some pretty bizarre and convoluted methods... all equally worthless. But what is interesting is how players valued individual pieces compared to today. Anyway, the more I read, the more convinced I am on how transient and subjective a value of a piece is during a game. This makes me appreciate the so-called Reinfeld system for at least being the most simple and easily calculable method for quickly comparing relative material strength between sides.
"The results arrived at in calculating "the power of each piece as estimated by the average number of squares from which it can affect the adverse K's movements and by the average amount of influence it exerts over him from each position" are these—Queen 74.9848, Rook 41.1729, Knight 37.25, Bishop 16.0375, Pawn -917975." ("BCM," March 1884, p.79) is beyond me. I'd rather spend that time trying to understand the position on the board.
Before chess databases, people craved game collections. Game collections came in many forms, such a a player's best games or even a tournament book. A rather nice collection of games was amassed by Reinfeld in a book called, "Great Brilliancy Prize Games of the Chess Masters" which was published by Collier in 1961.
The game selections and annotations were great... the side notes, maybe less so.
This book opens with a game between Emmanuel Schiffers and Max Harmonist. Schiffers makes some lovely moves and Harmonist finds himself on the wrong side of a Brilliancy Prize.
Odd;y, Reinfeld prefaces the game:
"The Annals of Chess are shrewn with the names of second-rate players who created a first-class brilliancy. Here is one such."
If one is unfamilar with either of these players, see:
Max Harmonist
Emmanuel Schiffers
Schiffers, who taught Tschigorin, was anything but a second-rate player in his day and no stranger to brilliant play.
According the "British Chess Magazine," Nov. 1888 (p.444):
Germany.—The prize of £5 5s. offered by Mr. F. H. Lewis of London, for the prettiest game in the last Frankfort Congress, has been awarded to M. Schiffers of St. Petersburg, for his game with Herr Harmonist. This is rather a late decision, as the Frankfort tourney was held in July, 1885.
The prize was possibly partly based upon the deflection tactic on move 16, followed up with impeccable technique.