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Every player who aspires to have a systematic understanding of the openings must start with Fine's Ideas Behind the Chess Openings. As a beginner before, I used to play grandmaster games on chessbooks, magazines and memorize the first ten to fifteen moves without knowing the underlying ideas behind the openings. I could thus play booklines, but I didn't really know what the opening was all about. When my oppponent deviated from my memorized lines, I didn't know how to continue. Then I read this book and I realized that you don't need to memorize very long variations to play the opening sensibly. Rather, the openings must be understood as a system, which entails knowing what white's or black's aims are in in a given opening. I learned, for example, that in the Sicilian defense white strives for a kingside attack while black counters in the queenside. In the King's Indian, on the other hand, black goes for a kingside attack while white, for a queenside breakthrough. I drastically improved my performance, and I won games not by tediously memorizing opening lines, but by designing my play consistent with the peculirities and the patterns in the different openings. I knew the proper continuation when my opponent had deviated from my book, or when the variation I studied had ended. Only after one has exhaustively studied this classic book must he explore more detailed and lengthy openings book like Modern Chess Openings and Nunn's Chess Openings. In fact, anyone can hardly get substantial information from those two books, or from any opening encyclopedia for that matter, without Fine's Ideas Behind the Chess Openings.

I've purchased four opening books over the past couple of years. If I had bought this book first instead of last I believe I would be proficient in the major openings now rather than just starting to learn them.Fine does exactly what the title suggests, he explains the ideas behind the openings. He groups them into four broad families which share important features. Where many books simply drown you in countless variations Fine clearly presents the major lines in terms of these shared features. Even if you can't keep the names straight or remember the entire move sequence of an opening you will know the primary strategic ideas involved. This book is not an encyclopedia of openings or a presentation of the latest in opening theory. It is, however, the only book I have ever seen that will help a recreational player develop a logical framework for understanding the opening. If you often find yourself unsure of what your plan should be after the second move then you need this book. Finally, I strongly recommend against buying Seirawan's "Winning Chess Openings".

While this isn't a book for the casual player, it will help a player who wants to study the game by giving him or her insight into how to approach and play the opening, in general. This is accomplished, somewhat surprsingly, through the lucid explanation of specific lines and typical plans across across a wide range of openings. The benefit of Fine's work is that a diligent reader eventually sees more than the thickets of variations, and comes to understand how and why openings are played the way they are by the game's strongest players. If you're looking for a reference work with lots of modern variations and sub-variations, this isn't for you. If you want to learn how to play the opening in chess, this is a great book!

One of the world's best players in the 1930s, Reuben Fine was also one of the great writers of chess as well. Before abruptly quitting chess for a professional career, he wrote several books on the game, however, two really stand above the rest: his classic Basic Chess Endings and the above title. Almost all serious chess players eventually read "Ideas" for one simple reason: Fine explains the concepts and ideas that underlie chess openings in a clear and concise manner. The eight chapters cover all the openings: e4 e5; e4 other; d4 d5; d4 other (Indian systems); English; Bird's/Nimzovich; and Irregular Openings. You won't find the latest lines in this book, rather, Fine presents variations that illustrate basic ideas, e.g., Black has two basic choices after 1. e4 e5: the strong point method or counter attack. The variations used illustrate typical methods of play. The original date of the book, 1943, makes a few of the general conclusions out of date--chess knowledge has progressed--but overall, there is no better introduction to chess opening theory. (A nice companion volume to this is Andy Soltis' Pawn Structure Chess.) The moves are given in figurine algebraic and there is a surprising number of typos, however, none that should cause real confusion. Every beginner should read this from cover to cover before selecting an opening system to play. Once you understand the ideas, tactics, and plans behind a particular system, the current "trendy" variations will make much more sense. This volume really should be in every chess players library.

I have a chess library that contains several hundred dollars worth of books. And looking at them there are three that I have learned more from than all the rest: IDEAS BEHIND THE CHESS OPENINGS by Reuben Fine, MY SYSTEM by Aron Nimzowitsch, and COLLE SYSTEM by George Koltanowski. A game of chess has three phases: the opening, middlegame, and endgame. This book, as its title says, concentrates primarily on the opening phase, but it also gives the reader plenty of ideas and strategy to carry into the middlegame. Fine explains those opening strategies that both players (White and Black) must strive for in order to enter the middlegame with an advantage, or at least an equal position. He describes pawn structures that lead to positionally won or lost games and alternative variations on mainline opening themes. This book was written in the early 1940's but it still contains a wealth of understanding because the basic opening ideas are still valid today. This is a must-have for any aspiring chess player