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Top ten chess AUTHORS of all time ?

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Avatar of philidorposition
philidorposition
Oct 7, 2011
0
#41

I don't know about the precise ranks, but my list would definitely include Kotov (Think Like a Grandmaster), Botvinnik (almost all his works, but mainly Achieving the Aim and 100 Selected Games), Kasparov (My Great Predecessors), Silman (Endgame Manual), Dvoretsky (almost all his books, mainly ...Play series), Seirawan (...Winning series) Chernev (for his amazing enthusiasm) and Nunn.

Avatar of Lawdoginator
Lawdoginator
Oct 7, 2011
0
#42
MyCowsCanFly wrote:

Based on comments here, I started through "The Game of Chess" by Tarrasch. In the sections I've looked at, every sentence is a gem. It makes some subsequent works seem derivative.

How cool, his thoughts are available to me. It is funny though to see different legends with very different opinions on the same topic. Tarrasch is not shy about his opinions.

Reminds me of football where each side sees very, very different games even though it's the same game. However, even that is instructive.

Care to share any of these gems with us? 

Avatar of MyCowsCanFly
MyCowsCanFly
Oct 7, 2011
0
#43
Lawdoginator wrote:
MyCowsCanFly wrote:

Based on comments here, I started through "The Game of Chess" by Tarrasch. In the sections I've looked at, every sentence is a gem. It makes some subsequent works seem derivative.

How cool, his thoughts are available to me. It is funny though to see different legends with very different opinions on the same topic. Tarrasch is not shy about his opinions.

Reminds me of football where each side sees very, very different games even though it's the same game. However, even that is instructive.

Care to share any of these gems with us? 

Tarrasch very clearly states, do not share these gems with other chess players. In fact, uncharacteristically, he discourages readers from nominating him as one of the top ten authors of all time.

Avatar of cormac_zoso
cormac_zoso
Oct 7, 2011
0
#44

Lots of all time great authors mentioned in this thread and most are the ones you almost have to come across while trying to improve your game (nimzo, alekhine, capa, tal, bronstein, etc) ... Glad to see 'crazychessplaya' mentiuoned Nunn ... of course his mco work is well known, but his serious on the najdorf is really outstanding i think and should be included in everyone's studies ... not to mention his 'opposing' side 'how to beat the sicilian' (i think there are 3 editions of this one thru the years) ...

While he might not be in the ten best, Drazen Marovic has always been a favorite author of mine ... his work on the King's Indian Defense, "Opening Repretoire for Black" which is half KID and half Sicilian, really made the concepts come alive for me ... i know various authors can ring bells for various players but DM is one that rings true for me ... also his work on pawn structure is well knowm, 'Dynamic' and 'Understanding' pawn play ... both books are very well worth your study time

DM might not be top ten considering how many giants there are but he's close in my book :)

Avatar of Splane
NM Splane
Oct 7, 2011
0
#45

One writer nobody has mentioned is Reuben Fine. He wrote Basic Chess Endings, Ideas behind the Chess Openings, a middlegame manual and at least one edition of Modern Chess Openings, among others.

I mentioned George Mason in a previous comment, but I was mistaken. His first name is James, not George.  

Avatar of goldendog
goldendog
Oct 7, 2011
0
#46

Honorable mention for Tartakover. Though he had just 500 Master Games and his autobiographical collection, they were good ones!

Avatar of GlennLadrido
GlennLadrido
Oct 7, 2011
0
#47
Splane wrote:

One writer nobody has mentioned is Reuben Fine. He wrote Basic Chess Endings, Ideas behind the Chess Openings, a middlegame manual and at least one edition of Modern Chess Openings, among others.

I mentioned George Mason in a previous comment, but I was mistaken. His first name is James, not George.  

actually sir i mentioned him (GM Fine) in my previous comment.. i think he's a great author because he lays the concepts in a manner that everyone can easily understand. (not enough examples though to grasp the entire the whole scenario, at least at my current strenghtLaughing)

 

thanks to this thread, i actually DLed some of the moves you mention (i'm almost halfway through chess praxis now, really good book)

cheers!Tongue out

Avatar of GlennLadrido
GlennLadrido
Oct 7, 2011
0
#48
Splane wrote:

I think I could name a dozen. here's my list, in no particular order.

1. Tarrasch took Steinitz's ideas and made them available to a wide public.

2/3. The hypermoderns: Nimzovich for My System and Chess Praxis and Richard Reti for Masters of the Chessboard and New Ideas in Chess.

4. Alekhine wrote several great books: New York 1924 and his two My Best Games collections.

5. Max Euwe for his Master versus Amateur and his two volumes on the middlegame.

6. Botvinnik for his game collections. He is called the patriarch because his ideas were so widely influential in Russia. 

7. Kotov for several books but mainly for Think Like a Grandmaster.

8. Bronstein for 300 Open Games and Zurich 1953, the Chess Struggle in Action.

9. Bobby Fischer didn't write anywhere near enough but I think his My Sixty Memorable Games is a great book.

10. Kasparov for numerous great books.

11. Paul Keres for his Two volume Best Games collections

12. Frank Marshall for his Best Games collection

Hans Kmoch for Pawn Power in Chess deserves honorable mention but his penchant for weird terminology keeps him out of the top dozen. Pachman is another I would give honrable mention to. 

I am leaving out the great writers who popularized chess for the masses, guys like Chernev, Horowitz, Reinfeld and Silman. I'd also mention George Mason - his Chess Handbook was the most widely popular chess book of the 19th century.

I'm also leaving out guys from the last thirty years, except for Kasparov, who must be included. Their books haven't yet withstood the test of time.

sir, while looking for pdf's of the books you mention, i found out that there are actually 2 books with almost the same title.. New ideas in Chess is actually written by Larry Evans and Reti's book is titled Modern Ideas in chess.. just a correction sir,  no offense intended.. just for those who also want to DL most of your recommended books just like me.. (though i doubt i'd be finished reading and assimilating this wide selection for the next 10 yearsTongue out)

Avatar of fburton
fburton
Oct 8, 2011
0
#49
MyCowsCanFly wrote:

Based on comments here, I started through "The Game of Chess" by Tarrasch. In the sections I've looked at, every sentence is a gem. It makes some subsequent works seem derivative.

Does anyone know where I can buy a copy of this book (in algebraic, please) that isn't for silly money?

Avatar of chessmaster102
chessmaster102
Oct 8, 2011
0
#50
Godspawn wrote:

Ruben Fine - The middle game in chess

Jeremy Silman - Many fine books

Kasparov - My Predecessors collection

Capablanca - His Best Games is must reading

Bronstein - Zurich 1953 If not the best chess book ever, one of the best

Euwe - Chess master vs. Chess Amateur

Fischer - My 60 memorable games

Endgame Virtuoso Anatoly Karpov: The Exceptional Endgame Skills of the 12th World Champion

One of my personal favorites.   Alex Dunne - How to be a Class A player

I find this intresting since not one but all of the books except #2 (just wasnt specific) are books recommended for players of the Expert (2000+) although these books are there to be enjoyed by all mostly experts or higher can really use and apply what they learn from those books to there games.

Avatar of Andre_Harding
Andre_Harding
Oct 8, 2011
0
#51

chessmaster102:

This is a fair point. However, I can say that in my case, I read many of the recommended books well before I became an Expert.

When I was rated 1064 USCF (summer of 1997), I played through the games in Zurich 1953, which almost singlehandedly rose me to 1300 in a few months. I have never had such a jump before or since, unfortunately. It was 14 years ago, but I seem to also remember working through Znosko-Borovsky's How to Play the Chess Endings earlier that year, a book which still influences my play to this day. At the end of 1997 I took up the French Defense, which was a perfect fit for me at that time (and I used it for the next 10 years).

In early 1998 I tried to understand Chess Praxis. It was too tough for me, but I guess it helped a little bit. I think it was also in 1998 when I tried to study Alekhine's games collection, and that too was too tough for me, though, again, the accumulation of all this stuff helped me reach 1600 in October 1999.