MIddlegame Book 1:: Static Features: Static Features Bk. 1 [Englisch] [Taschenbuch]

Covers: 1) The relative worth of the pieces; 2) Most every type of pawn position ever known ( the most instructive part of the book); 3) The Struggle for open lines ( open files; the minority attack; Controlling open files etc.); 4) Weak Pawns

Despite what the publisher says above, this is not a book for the novice.

The concepts are subtle. ( The games given illustrate the author's points, and should be studied in the general framework that the author's present.) The best part of the book is the explanatory prose at the start of each chapter. It is general in nature, but then borne out ny the games that follow.

The binding is horrible. My book is in two pieces with several pieces of tape holding various parts of the first half of the book together. Minus 1 star for that.

(NOTE: For some reason Amazon sells te two volumes of this book--"Static" and "Dynamic" features-seperately. This review refers to both volumes.)

Buy this book. It is well-written, instructive, and will help your rating. It is also... honest, modest, and civilized. With the reader's permission, I will explain these three less common features first.

By "honesty" I mean that this book--by a world champion (Euwe) and a strong gradnmaster (Kramer) is obviously not the case of the world champion lending his name to the book and letting the other author do all the work. Clearly--as can be seen by the inclusion of many deeply-annotated games by Euwe (as well as by Kramer), he did a lot of the work himself. By "modesty" I mean that the book often includes lesser-known games that both Euwe and Kramer *lost*--as long as their opponents played in an instructive fashion. The authors don't try to make themselves look like invincible supermen; they only care about teaching the reader. By "civlized" I mean that the writing style is sober and to the point. The English translation (and presumably the original Dutch) is refreshingly free of slang and superlatives. So is the analysis itself: when the authors speak--for instance--about different pawn formations in the center, they note which type of formation usually arises from what kind of opening and how to play it, and give instructive games as examples. C'est tout. They do not include any waffle about "development" or "the center" in general as space fillers, explicit or implicit promises that if you only learn to play these formations you will become an expert/master/grandmaster/world champion (as some unscrupulous authors do), or games full of "!!" punctuations for moves that merely follow the correct general plan.

So much for style. What about the chess content itself? The book is divided into a few large topics, each of them excellently presented. The first volume is wholly occupied with "static" features: pawn formation, material imbalance, etc. The second deals (first of all) with two types of "dynamic" issues--that is, issues that depend not so much on the *number* or *formation* of the pieces but on their *activity*: the initiative, second, attack and defense against the king.

These issues are crucial to becoming a better chess player. What's more, Euwe and Kramer deal with the matter in severely practical style. They concentrate on the "problem-solving" issues players face: "when to exchange pawns or lock the center, and when should I keep the tension?" "what are the most important goals a defender must keep in mind?", "when I have two rooks for the queen, what should I do?", and so on. This is a far more practical way to improve than merely learning general strategic principles, since it connects directly to features of the common positions amateurs can actually recognize over the board in their actual games. In particular, the initiative is not seen as some mysterious, Grandmaster-only feature of the game, but defined clearly and distinguished from the *attack*--something amateurs very, very often confuse. How to correctly turn the initiative into an attack--a crucial feature of master chess that's utterly lacking from most amateur games--is dealt with in a particularly enlightening fashion.

The latter sections of the second book is worth the price of both books all by themselves (without diminishing the importance of what comes before). They deal with two exceedingly important issues for amateurs: when and how to exchange pieces, and how to avoid the two most common strategic mistakes amateurs make (snatching material and premature attack) in a very enlightening fashion. Most amateurs know vaguely some general principles of the "exchange pieces when ahead in material", "don't grab pawns", or "attack only when ready" but there is a *lot* more to both subject than that. Read the book and learn.

The only section of the book that may be a bit over the head of most amateurs is that of "style". In it, the games of various greats are examined in terms of their preference for positions with one type of feature over another (say, master X prefered piece activity to solid pawn formation, while master Y was best in positions with two bishops, etc.) The one problem is that the student better know VERY well what these elements of the middlegame are before he can begin to understand what preference for one element over another really means (I haven't reached that stage, myself.) That said, this section, as all the others, avoids superlatives (e.g., the "genius" of Capablanca and Morphy, etc.) in favor of concrete games and examples of their style.

These are wonderfully instructive books. Full games are used to illustrate specific points. If enjoy Euwe and Meidens's Chess Master vs. Chess Amateur, let these be your next books on strategy. (I suggest sticking with an author you like.) These are probably most helpful for someone rated between 1600 and 1800 USCF. (Never waste time on chess books that are over your head.)

If you have trouble with the binding, search the web for the books in ChessBase format. They are encrypted, and the key is found in the books themselves. So once you have bought the books, you can read them in ChessBase at no extra charge.

4 stars for the books, plus one for the files.