GARRY KASPAROV’S GREATEST CHESS GAMES, volume 1
Author: GM Igor Stohl
2005 Gambit Publishing (info@gambits.com)
320 pages
Hardback, $35.00

Reviewed by John Donaldson

The timing for Slovak GM Igor Stohl’s second book is quite interesting. First Gary Kasparov, on anybody’s short list of the greatest players of all time, announced his retirement from competitive play earlier this year. Second, Kasaparov’s MY GREAT PREDECESSORS series has not yet progressed to Karpov. This means you have to go back approximately twenty years to find Kasparov’s last detailed work on his games.

All these points make the timing excellent for the appearance of the first volume of GARRY KASPAROV’S GREATEST CHESS GAMES. Stohl, who established his reputation as a first rate author with INSTRUCTIVE MODERN CHESS MASTERPIECES (winner of the United States Chess Federation Cramer Award for Best Chess Book), has selected 74 of Kasparov’s best and most instructive games from 1973 to 1993, and annotated them in detail. These games run the gamut from World Championship matches (Karpov and Short) to simultaneous exhibitions (Behrhorst, Zuger and Wahls. There are games from GMA World Cup tournaments and also a rapid game. Chances are that when Kasparov does come out with an updated work on his games, his selection may differ somewhat from Stohl’s but not to a huge extent.

GARRY KASPAROV’S GREATEST CHESS GAMES was undoubtedly many years in the making. Most of Kasparov’s games were subjected to close scutiny both in Chess Informant and magazines around the world. Stohl, who had a regular monthly column in a Czech magazine for many years where he did detailed annotations has unquestionably made use of this material, synthesized it, and added to it. The result is a tremendous book that should inspire chessplayers everywhere. Not only is the book excellently written but it is also a beautifully produced oversize hardback.

Those who would like to see an example of Stohl’s fine work before buying this book are suggested to go to http://badbishop.com/gambit/pdfs/328Samp.pdf where an excerpt, Kasparov-Andersson, Tilburg 1981, is reproduced in full.

Highly Recommended.

Click to buy GARRY KASPAROV'S GREATEST CHESS GAME VOLUME 1

Click to buy Stohl’s INSTRUCTIVE MODERN CHESS MASTERPIECES