The Immortal Games of Capablanca

I, personally, hate long reviews of books, so I'm going to make this short and sweet! Capablanca was one of the greatest players of all time. Mr. Reinfeld (the author) adds stunning history behind the games and tells the reader what to expect of certain games in the intro of each chapter. The only bad mark that I can give this book is that the annotations seem a little brief at times; however, this book will teach you so much about the game of chess that one bad mark should never prevent a serious player from getting this classic!

No other collection of Capablanca's best games even begins to rival this one. I believe the annotation to be a little lighter at times than it could be, but the work is---nonetheless---excellent. If you have not yet become familiar with the Cuban's best games, buy and read this book!

José Raúl Capablanca (1888-1942) is widely regarded as one of the all-time great chess players, and possibly the greatest natural chess genius in history. World champion from 1921-1927, he is the only player to have won the world title by defeating the incumbent in a match without losing a game. Grandmaster Robert Byrne, in his foreword, pointed how Capablanca's games were the greatest influence on the modern great world champion Bobby Fischer, and Anatoly Karpov is another disciple. Mikhail Botvinnik (three times world champ) also related how much he learned from Capablanca, and pointed out that even his successor Alexander Alekhine received much schooling from him in positional play, before the struggle for the world title made them bitter foes.Once players have read all the introductory books about endgames, openings, tactics and basic strategy, to improve, they must study master games. Capablanca's crystal clarity of style makes his an ideal object of study.Reinfeld does a good job here, as he did with his collection of Tarrasch's games. There are plenty of fine endgames, Capa's forté, but lots of brilliancy prize games as well. By the time Capa had won the world title, he had a unique record - winning a brilliancy prize at every master tournament he had played in where one was awarded.In his biographical sketch of Capa, Reinfeld states his belief in Alekhine's superiory. But Byrne's foreword points out that Alekhine never fulfilled his obligation to play a return match, and selected weaker opponents instead of facing him again. In fact, their first game after their world championship match was nine years later at the great Nottingham 1936 tournament - Capa won both the game and the first prize (with Botvinnik).The games in this book naturally overlap the ones in Golombek's book, but why not get both at such a bargain price?

Capablanca plays enchanting chess. He plays chess like no other else, making the strongest players of his time look like beginners. The simplicity and the economy with how he wins is brought to life by such a good author in Fred Reinfeld.

Fred Reinfeld showed here that he could write good chess books when the subject interested him. The games of Capablanca are of interest to all serious players, and the author does a good job of annotating some of the Cuban genius's very best.