Gambit Publications continues to produce first-rate chess books, and has increasingly turned towards books on more general subjects such as strategy, chess thinking, attack, and defense. They also continue to find excellent first-time authors (or those whose work has not appeared in English until now). Viacheslav Eingorn's DECISION-MAKING AT THE CHESSBOARD is a difficult but extraordinarily interesting work, mainly because of the way that Eingorn looks at the development of games with a view towards their critical positions and decisions. Most of the games are Eingorn's own, although he includes a number of classics to re-analyze in the light of their critical decisions. I wouldn't call most of the material sprightly, but it's far more useful and instructive than the standard “How to Play Positional Chess” stuff that has been appearing of late.

The first chapter is worth talking about: We know that this is a different sort of book when Eingorn dares to part from historical stereotypes. In the very first game in the book, he presents the ultra-famous Reti-Alekhine, Baden-Baden 1925 with the shot 26...Re3!. Eingorn discusses the positional course of the game, describing Reti's advantageous alternatives at several points. He comments that “[Alekhine's] tactics are remarkable, but his strategy occupies a worthy second place; it was Reti's play that determined the unfolding of events...” Of course that isn't the usual interpretation that books give, since they are swayed by the power and beauty of Black's buildup and attack. Alekhine's own simplistic summary of the game is that White first has c-file pressure, Black counterattacks, and then his move 26...Re3! gains the advantage. Eingorn shows that this isn't the case and says “this commentary also shows a certain limitation of thought belonging to a player with a pronounced individuality.” Whether that's generally true or not, the same has been said of Tal and Petrosian, for example, whose pronounced styles could legitimately be argued to reflect their “limitations of thought” (although “prejudices” might be a more accurate term).

In fact, Eingorn takes the well-known game Petrosian-Bannik, USSR Ch 1958, a positional masterpiece by White, and points out that Petrosian lets Bannik off the hook at one point by an inferior move that “shies away from immediate action”. His extremely lengthy analysis shows that a superior move would have involved exchanging his good bishop for Black's bad one. As has been pointed out by others, this move with its assessment has been overlooked by all other annotators. Eingorn adds: “The issue tends to be confused by formal considerations about 'good' and 'bad' bishops. Repudiating the baneful influence of terminology, we should observe that in principle a piece fulfilling a useful function cannot be bad.” [jw: In this case, as Suba says, the “bad” bishop was defending a good pawn.] But since Bannik's mistake on the next move allows Petrosian to play precisely the same move with the same idea, one wonders if so much detailed analysis was necessary to get the point across.

Several reviewers have quoted Eingorn's original thoughts about Lasker: “People basically associate Lasker's achievements with questions of chess psychology – quite misguidedly, it seems to me. His manner of play (like that of Petrosian at a later date) simply didn't fit into the customary framework of standard chess thought: attack, defense, playing for position.” Eingorn backs this up by analyzing two famous Lasker games. The portrait of Lasker as master psychologist has always struck me as extremely limited and missing the essence of his play. Yet it is constantly perpetuated in books, for example, in Kasparov's PREDECESSORS.

Incidentally, Eingorn also talks about the position after 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 f5 3.Nxe5 Qf6 4.d4 d6 5.Nc4 fxe4, where in a famous game against Behting in 1919, Nimzowitsch chose 6.Ne3, leading to 6...c6 7.Bc4 d5 8.Bb3 followed by c4. This game was widely annotated through the years, most famously by the participants. In 1941 in the same position, Bronstein played 6.Be2, which Eingorn describes as reflecting his style and his philosophic desire to prevent his opponent's plans, i.e., the move prevents 6...Qg6 due to 7.Bh5. He apparently doesn't realize that Behting himself had analyzed 6.Be2 in his notes. Quite possibly Bronstein was aware of the move, and in any case we see that it doesn't take a genius to come up with the idea.

Chapter 2 continues with the idea of a player's style influencing his decisions, again emphasizing the importance of concrete lines and calculations to support such decisions. This is probably the most important theme throughout the book. He begins with a game by Tal (against Eingorn himself), saying of Tal's most critical decision that it reflects his style but that “there are always concrete features of the position that no one can ignore”. He shows that precise calculations would have revealed a much superior move than the one produced by Tal's intuition. As in so many modern books, the emphasis is on concrete calculations, but Eingorn gladly limits his truly messy analysis to critical points and emphasizes the role of judgment and intuition in deciding when to go in particular directions. He applies his ideas to attack, defense, and even to what you should do when no idea occurs to you.

The bulk of the games are Eingorn's own. His games with White usually begin with 1.d4 (there are 16 Queen's Gambits) or less often, 1.c4. So you can imagine that positional struggles dominate the early parts of the game, although tactics and positions requiring serious calculations are important at the decisive junctures. As Black, similarly, he often plays slow lines with 1...e5 versus 1.e4, and when he plays 1...e6 he interprets it extremely positionally (playing, for example, ...b6 and ...Ba6). Eingorn is often self-critical, presenting his mistakes as object lessons. In one game, after 1.d4 d6 2.c4 e5 3.Nf3 e4 4.Ng1 f5 5.Nc3, he plays 5...Nd7, appending the amusing remark: “an amazingly inept idea”.

Naturally there's much more here to discuss, but I'll leave it at that. I highly recommend the book for those willing to bite into some complex and eye-opening material. For casual readers, be warned that it is less an entertaining book than an instructive one.