Memorising chess games

Hi,

I've started to memorise chess games from my books by brute force. Basically, write all of the notation down and memorise it the hard way. I exclude the variations the first time round, then include them after the game's been memorised.

Now the reason why I'm posting this is that there is a saying you shouldn't focus on opening theory until you're such and such rating. I'm not being funny but this is bullshit. Opening book games that I'm going over continue for about 50-60 moves until a win or draw. By memorising them, I've learnt so much about structure, ideas and endgames I can't express it enough that it is best to memorise games.

Now there is a slight catch. Let's say it's a 60 move game. The first 30 odd moves with author explanation are fairly easy to memorise. It's the final 30 move endgame chunk with zero explanation is the hardest part to memorise.

It takes me about 4 to 5 days to memorise a long winded game all the way until a king pawn endgame. Now, I've heard Carlsen knows 5000 odd games off by heart. Man I take my hat off to these guys. At this rate it's going to take me over a year to memorise 50 games! LOL

Memorizing games is legit. 

It's friggin' hard, but it's one of the best ways to learn and absorb correct methods of play.

Even better is memorizing a game AND all the main refutations and variations of commonly expected responses. 

All the folks who put down memorization don't understand that ALL of chess is memorization, ultimately. Your chances of seeing the best move in a tactical situation or a subtle positional nuance are greastest if you've memorized similar positions in the past. Understanding and memorization are intrically linked - they're not separate.

It is a lot of work don't get me wrong. I am no Fischer by any means, but these greats have had to memorise an abundance of games for the ideas to improve on.

Another thing I'm noticing by memorising games is the small quiet positional moves that make such a difference for the endgame.

No you're not. 

Something a little similar actually happened when Brian Keenan was held in captivity in solitary or at different times with one or two others in the Lebanon. 

Memorizing games isn't the same as learning opening theory. Learning some openings may be a useful byproduct though. I agree it's useful to play over complete games, and memorizing some whole games (while having the author's annotations to make sense of the moves) is not bad.

One should always use his/her brain to a certain limit. Whats the use of unnecessary clogging ones brain with the things which are practically useless and unproductive?

PS. remember that crazy Fischer, Morphy and Pillsbury? They went crazy due to excessive brain strain..

Whoa there Dr. Brainsurgeon. Not everyone has a fancy medical degree. No one's going to understand this technical jargon.

 IM David Pruess has a four video series on memorizing games, maybe he will have some tips to speed it up for you.

Here's the link to the first:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ibI-AHhLqqg

Well, his account didn't last long.