Lasker's Manual of Chess (German : Lehrbuch des Schachspiels) is a book on the game of chess written in 1925 by former World Chess Champion Emanuel Lasker. The content of the book, as Lasker himself writes, is most influenced by the theories put forth by Steinitz, as well as Staunton's The Chess-Player's Handbook.
The book is divided into six sections: The Elements of Chess, The Theory of the Openings, The Combination, Position Play, The Aesthetic Effect in Chess, and Examples and Models.
The Elements of Chess opens with a description of the chess board, the various rules of chess, and the relative values of the pieces. Lasker quickly moves on to the fundamentals of chess strategy and tactics, and ends the section with examples of some of the basic mates. He also explains how to read descriptive chess notation, which is used throughout the book.
The Theory of the Openings begins with an explanation of the general principles of opening play and how openings affect the course of the middlegame and endgame. The rest of the section attempts to cover many of the major openings, providing example games and analyses of each. This section ends by detailing the increasing value of pawns as they advance in rank, in contrast to their value in the opening.
The Combination covers combinational play (also called "tactical play" or "tactics"), beginning with explanations of some basic combinations, and moving on to detail a number of games meant to exemplify combinational style. Lasker goes on to explain how combinations can be most effectively countered, and what common "motifs" emerge from combinational play. He also spends considerable time on the subject of piece sacrifices and passed pawns.
Position Play is prefaced with an exposition on the difference between positional play and combinational play, and Lasker stresses their diametrical opposition. He explains the importance of having a clear "plan" of the game, and provides a number of example games. The rest of the section is concerned with identifying and describing the various "features" and "advantages" of a position, such as its pawn structure and potential for piece cooperation. In the closing pages of this section Lasker criticizes the hypermodern school of chess for disregarding many accepted principles of positional play.
The Aesthetic Effect in Chess finds Lasker expounding on the ways that the subjective "aesthetic valuations" of a "spectator" cause him or her to have vastly different opinions of the same game. The rest of this section comprises various famously uncanny games, such as the Immortal game and the Evergreen game, with some analysis from Lasker.
Examples and Models, the book's final section, consists entirely of a number of illustrative games, each with a thorough analysis.
The book closes with a short essay titled Final Reflections, in which Lasker describes the state of education in the world as "frightfully wasteful of time and values", and states that this "sickness" is responsible for the difficulties many players face in learning chess. Lasker also goes on to speculate about the mathematics of chess, the "physics of contest", and the correctness of Steinitz's theories.
An updated edition was published in January 2009, ISBN 978-1-888690-50-7.
Chess is a board game for two players, called White and Black, each controlling an army of chess pieces in their color, with the objective to checkmate the opponent's king. It is sometimes called international chess or Western chess to distinguish it from related games such as xiangqi and shogi. The recorded history of chess goes back at least to the emergence of a similar game, chaturanga, in seventh century India. The rules of chess as they are known today emerged in Europe at the end of the 15th century, with standardization and universal acceptance by the end of the 19th century. Today, chess is one of the world's most popular games played by millions of people worldwide.
Chess strategy is the aspect of chess play concerned with evaluation of chess positions and setting goals and long-term plans for future play. While evaluating a position strategically, a player must take into account such factors as the relative value of the pieces on the board, pawn structure, king safety, position of pieces, and control of key squares and groups of squares. Chess strategy is distinguished from chess tactics, which is the aspect of play concerned with the move-by-move setting up of threats and defenses. Some authors distinguish static strategic imbalances, which tend to persist for many moves, from dynamic imbalances, which are temporary. This distinction affects the immediacy with which a sought-after plan should take effect. Until players reach the skill level of "master", chess tactics tend to ultimately decide the outcomes of games more often than strategy. Many chess coaches thus emphasize the study of tactics as the most efficient way to improve one's results in serious chess play.
This glossary of chess explains commonly used terms in chess, in alphabetical order. Some of these terms have their own pages, like fork and pin. For a list of unorthodox chess pieces, see Fairy chess piece; for a list of terms specific to chess problems, see Glossary of chess problems; for a list of named opening lines, see List of chess openings; for a list of chess-related games, see List of chess variants; for a list of terms general to board games, see Glossary of board games.
William Steinitz was a Bohemian-Austrian and, later, American chess player. From 1886 to 1894, he was the first World Chess Champion. He was also a highly influential writer and chess theoretician.
Zugzwang is a situation found in chess and other turn-based games wherein one player is put at a disadvantage because of their obligation to make a move; a player is said to be "in zugzwang" when any legal move will worsen their position.
Emanuel Lasker was a German chess player, mathematician, and philosopher who was World Chess Champion for 27 years, from 1894 to 1921, the longest reign of any officially recognised World Chess Champion in history. In his prime, Lasker was one of the most dominant champions, and he is still generally regarded as one of the strongest players in history.
The Queen's Gambit is the chess opening that starts with the moves:
Siegbert Tarrasch was a German chess player, considered to have been among the strongest players and most influential theoreticians of the late 19th and early 20th century.
The middlegame is the portion of a chess game between the opening and the endgame. It is generally considered to begin when each player has completed the development of all or most of their pieces and brought their king to relative safety, and it is generally considered to end when only a few pieces remain on the board. However, there is no clear line between the opening and middlegame or between the middlegame and endgame. At master level, the opening analysis may go well into the middlegame; likewise, the middlegame blends into the endgame.
In chess, a relative value is a standard value conventionally assigned to each piece. Piece valuations have no role in the rules of chess but are useful as an aid to assessing a position.
Hypermodernism is a school of chess that emerged after World War I. It featured challenges to the chess ideas of central European masters, including Wilhelm Steinitz's approach to the centre and the rules established by Siegbert Tarrasch.
In chess, a queen sacrifice is a move that sacrifices a queen in return for some compensation, such as a tactical or positional advantage.
Romantic chess is a style of chess popular in the 18th century until its decline in the 1880s. This style of chess emphasizes quick, tactical maneuvers rather than long-term strategic planning. Romantic players consider winning to be secondary to winning with style. The Romantic era of play was followed by the Scientific, Hypermodern, and New Dynamism eras. Games during this era generally consisted of 1.e4 openings such as the King's Gambit and Giuoco Piano. Queen-side pawn openings were not popular and seldom played. The Romantic era is generally considered to have ended with the 1873 Vienna tournament where Wilhelm Steinitz popularized positional play and the closed game. This domination ushered in a new age of chess known as the "Modern", or Classical school, which would last until the 1930s when hypermodernism began to become popular.
In chess, the exchange is a material difference of a minor piece for a rook. The side which wins the rook is said to have won the exchange, while the other player has lost the exchange, since the rook is usually more valuable. Alternatively, the side having a rook for a minor piece is said to be up the exchange, and the other player is down the exchange. The opposing captures often happen on consecutive moves, although this is not strictly necessary. It is generally detrimental to lose the exchange, although occasionally one may find reason to purposely do so; the result is an exchange sacrifice. The minor exchange is an uncommon term for the exchange of a bishop and knight.
In chess, an exchange or trade of chess pieces is a series of closely related moves, typically sequential, in which the two players capture each other's pieces. Any type of pieces except the kings may possibly be exchanged, i.e. captured in an exchange, although a king can capture an opponent's piece. Either the player of the white or the black pieces may make the first capture of the other player's piece in an exchange, followed by the other player capturing a piece of the first player, often referred to as a recapture. Commonly, the word "exchange" is used when the pieces exchanged are of the same type or of about equal value, which is an even exchange. According to chess tactics, a bishop and a knight are usually of about equal value. If the values of the pieces exchanged are not equal, then the player who captures the higher-valued piece can be said to be up the exchange or wins the exchange, while the opponent who captures the lower-valued piece is down the exchange or loses the exchange. Exchanges occur very frequently in chess, in almost every game and usually multiple times per game. Exchanges are often related to the tactics or strategy in a chess game, but often simply occur over the course of a game.
In chess, there is a general consensus among players and theorists that the player who makes the first move (White) has an inherent advantage. Since 1851, compiled statistics support this view; White consistently wins slightly more often than Black, usually scoring between 52 and 56 percent. White's winning percentage is about the same for tournament games between humans and games between computers; however, White's advantage is less significant in blitz games and games between lower-level players.
The game of chess is commonly divided into three phases: the opening, middlegame, and endgame. There is a large body of theory regarding how the game should be played in each of these phases, especially the opening and endgame. Those who write about chess theory, who are often also eminent players, are referred to as "theorists" or "theoreticians".
A school of chess denotes a chess player or group of players that share common ideas about the strategy of the game. There have been several schools in the history of modern chess. Today there is less dependence on schools – players draw on many sources and play according to their personal style.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to chess: