Last Lectures The Chess Legacy of Jose Raoul Capabanca - Softcover

Capablanca, Jose Raoul

Softcover

ISBN 10: 4871877574 ISBN 13: 9784871877572

Publisher: Ishi Press, 2016

Synopsis

Last Lectures is, as the name suggests, a series of lectures given over the radio by former World Chess Champion José Raúl Capablanca just a few months before he died. While he was preparing these lectures, he dictated them to his wife, Olga Capablanca, who typed them. As a result, we have them today. Perhaps more than any other player in the history of chess, Jose Raoul Capablanca was noted for his ability to cut through the complexities of modern chess theory and find the winning line in grandmaster tournament play. Capablanca was often called the greatest natural chess player of all time. His clarity of vision, his simplicity and precision of style were legendary. Here, in these twelve lectures originally delivered by short-wave radio to a Latin American audience shortly before his death in 1942, the qualities that made Capablanca one of the game's uniquely great masters are reflected in a timeless legacy of chess wisdom. His observations on the fundamental principles of sound chess thinking are expressed so clearly and simply that a novice can follow them; yet they touch on such profoundly important underlying themes that the most advanced player will benefit by absorbing them. In fact, these lectures reveal that much of Capablanca's supposedly instinctive genius for unraveling highly complex situations over the board consisted of a deeper and sounder understanding of the basic principles of endgame strategy (and the ability to see the endgame structure foreshadowed during the tactical maneuvering of the middle game) than that possessed by any other player of his time. Last Lectures contains Capablanca's chess “instinct” preserved for a later generation. Over and over again he stresses the vital importance of knowing how to play the endings. He gives simple rules of proper endgame play many of which he says are often overlooked by top flight masters. He shows how to recognize the winning elements of the commonest endings: Rook and Pawn, Bishop vs. Knight. He gives his analysis of the relative value of the pieces. Even in this era of exhaustive analysis of the openings, there is wisdom and profit to be gained from his chapter on the Ruy Lopez. Perhaps the greatest pleasure for the modern player, whether he is a beginner or an expert, in reading Last Lectures will come from Capablanca's lively anecdotes and strongly expressed opinions about his contemporaries. Using their play as examples for his observations on universal chess truths, Capablanca rates (and sometimes rakes) Morphy, Steinitz, Emanuel Lasker, Nimzovch, Alekhine, Reshevsky, Frank Marshall and other chess immortals. Last Lectures will enrich the play, as well as the library, of all chess enthusiasts.

About this title

About the Author

Jose Capablanca was World Chess Champion from 1921 to 1927. He was born on 19 November 1888 in Havana, Cuba. His wife, Olga Capablanca, was a Russian princess although he said she knew nothing about chess. She was his second wife and he was her second husband. She was born Olga Evgenyevna Choubaroff on 23 September 1898 in Tbilisi, Georgia. Olga met her second husband, Jose Capablanca, in 1934 at a function given by the Cuban Consulate in New York. He was apparently immediately attracted to her and pursued her for a long time before she finally agreed to be married to him. They married in New York on October 20, 1938. When Capablanca was four years old, he learned to play chess just by watching his father play. His father was surprised when he corrected an illegal move, so his father played him a game and the child won the first game. When he was five, his father took him to the chess club. It was discovered that the players at the club were unable to beat him at queen odds. On March 8, 1942 Capablanca collapses at the Manhattan Chess Club and was taken to Mt. Sinai Hospital where he was pronounced dead at the age of 53. Olga later married Admiral Joseph James Jocko Clark. Admiral Joseph James "Jocko" Clark, USN (November 12, 1893 – July 13, 1971) was an admiral in the United States Navy, who commanded aircraft carriers during World War II. He also commanded the 7th fleet during the Korean war. He had a ship the USS Clark named after him which Olga christened at the launching on March 24, 1979. Olga Capablanca died on April 24, 1994 at age 95. She bequeathed the entire archives of Jose Raoul Capablanca to the Manhattan Chess Club.

Edition details

• Publisher: Ishi Press
• Publication date: 2016
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 4871877574
• ISBN 13: 9784871877572
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 136