David Bronstein (1) (1924–2006)

Was my number two Bronstein book after Zurich 1953, until Sorcerer's apprentice came out. Well, it is an embarrassment of riches from an alltime originals. Where Bronstein sacs a piece and his combinative vision is a style all to himself. Not even Tal's combinations have the surprise element of Bronstein's. Probably because Tal's games have become ingrained, whereas the breath gets taken away by the sheer originality of Bronstein's games.

The games are wonderful, but Bronstein's comments are rather scanty. For each game he gives us a few paragraphs of prose introduction, often including a few specific variations, but never much detail. Then comes the game score itself, entirely without notes; most of the games fit on a single page. Bronstein's remarks are often interesting and witty, but the games are so tactically rich that more detailed annotations would have been welcome. Fun, then, but lightweight.

You could certainly do worse for what amounts to an introductory text, but I'd hoped for more from Bronstein.

Never ask a question unless you know the answer.

So, I'm about to do the thing you do with this book. You call it stellar, you say it alone would be sufficient justification for the entire life of the writer, you rave on too much.

But then you see this, at Edward Winter's site:

Bronstein expressed irritation that he was remembered for his world championship match with Botvinnik and his book on the 1953 Candidates’ tournament.

Forget I mentioned your book David Bronstein.

And it gets show more worse. No wonder it irritates him to be remembered for this book.

Concerning the book on the Candidates’ tournament, Bronstein revealed that much of the text was by Boris Vainstein

Fuck.

And an update 25/10/2017. It gets so much worse: http://en.chessbase.com/post/shattered-illusions-genna-sosonkos-the-rise-and-fal... show less