Drazen Marovic's Dynamic Pawn Play is the successor to his Understanding Pawn Play in Chess. I didn't find that earlier work of exceptional interest, since it seemed to be mostly a restatement of the standard thoughts on pawn structures. Worth getting and of high-quality, but not groundbreaking. Dynamic Pawn Play is a more advanced book than that and contains some unique and original theoretical thinking. I wish that I could say that I have read more of it; for example, the back cover talks about discussion of the positional Exchange sacrifice, a subject I have great interest in, but I haven't found it yet! I do think that the general structure of the book is very interesting: it is arranged "historically" from the "open center" to the "closed center" to "the dynamic center." As Marovic explains, the last section was never meant to be as large as the first two combined, but "it is simply indicative of its frequent occurrence in master practice, the practical importance...and its general relevance to the state of theory of our times."

Marovic claims that the open center was well understood by the early part of this century, and that the closed center was "absorbed more slowly" but was broadly understood by the 1960s and, while the understanding has been much refined since, "strong players perceived and understood its underlying mechanisms years ago." But, he continues, "We could hardly say that of the dynamic pawn center", explaining that we are in a time of the "spirit of experimentation, readiness to enter the unknown and take risks, but first and foremost to a new attitude borne out of the conviction that all is possible if supported by concrete calculation..." My impression of the book is that it broadly supports this thesis by concentrating on annotated examples that tend to be, but are not limited to, well-known games from chess history.

This leads me to the most confusing thing about this book. "Pawn play" per se doesn't always seem to be its subject. In the "Open Center" section, there are a number of games that are to even an extreme degree illustrations of pure piece play without the influence of pawns! (Just for example, Tal-Smyslov on page 50). The idea is presumably that the central pawns have been swept away and then piece play decides, but it's still a bit strange to have so little pawn play in such an important section of the book. Furthermore, various games in the book are annotated into the late middlegame and endgame in cases where dynamic pawn play is not really the subject. Overall, however, Marovic's succession of appropriate examples throughout the book does indeed demonstrate his general point regarding the evolution of pawn play and of chess as a whole. In that context, I should mention that the examples are organized by general subject such as "Central Counterblow," "The Wing Attack Countered on the Same Wing" and the like. I also think that you could hardly find a better set of intelligently and mostly non-technically commented upon games. The prospective reader should realize that the book's value consists of those games and their relation to an overarching view of pawn play. If you're looking for a comprehensive textbook about pawn play, you won't find it here. The point that Marovic would perhaps make is that the way to acquire practical knowledge is by example and guidance, and this is what he provides. His earlier volume tends to work with specific, defined structures. In this new book he tries to provide some understanding of what kind of thinking is required to advance beyond that point. I view this book as an original and philosophic look at chess (and pawns) which is also a very good games collection.

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