- Paperback: 429 pages
- Publisher: Ishi Press (15 May 2009)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0923891439
- ISBN-13: 978-0923891435
- Product Dimensions: 2.3 x 1.5 x 0.2 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 4,635,298 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Description
Product Description
Grandmaster Arnold Denker - the Dean of American Chess, U. S. chess champion from 1944 to 1946, was the Runyonesque chronicler of the "guys and dolls" of the New York chess scene of the 1930s, and the man who treated personal friendship as a high art. No one meeting Arnold for the first time, however briefly, could doubt how he played the games of chess and life. You could see it. In his athletic build, in his well-tailored elegance, in how he chomped into one of his favorite, five-inch thick hot pastrami sandwiches at the old Applebaum's on New York's 7th Avenue - or, most impressively, in the way he crossed a street. For Grandmaster Denker did not just cross a street, he attacked it as he would an opponent's king. GM Denker played chess the way he crossed that street. His goal was nearly always to cross the center of the board on the way to his opponent's king. Some of his sorties were wing-and-prayer affairs, and they famously crashed. However, many of his tempestuous attacks, with their slashing assaults against enemy kings, did reach the other side of the board, producing victories and draws against the greatest players of his time.
About the Author
Grandmaster Arnold Denker was known as the e Grand Old Man of American Chess though you could never let this active 81-year-old hear you say that! In this memoir, GM Denker - who was U.S. Chess Champion from 1944 to 1946 – skillfully intertwines with his own life the stories of great chess men who he knew and loved. Denker, who is renowned as chess raconteur, was inducted into the U.S. Chess Hall of fame in 1993.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This is a good book about 20th century US chess and the autobiography of Denker, but the title is misleading like Searching for Bobby Fischer there is not much about Fischer in here.
Format:Paperback
This Damon Runyon-like work will be around well into the Twenty-first Century to inform future chess generations about such greats as Bobby Fischer and world champion Gary Kasparov as well as the "guys and dolls" of the New York chess scene during the fabled Golden Era of the 1930s and 1940s. In the Introduction, five-time U.S. Champion Larry Evans writes that the authors capture "some of the most raucous and colorful figures in 20th Century chess" with a "Dickensian precision." Yet there is plenty of hard chess in this big book - over 300 games and positions, many never before published, and which contain interesting opening ideas that have either been forgotten or neglected in the manuals.
Grandmaster Arnold Denker is known as the Grand Old Man of American Chess. In this memoir, GM Denker - who was U.S. chess champion from 1944 to 1946 - skillfully intertwines with his own life the stories of great chess men whom he knew and loved. Denker, who is renowned as a chess raconteur, was inducted into the U.S. Chess Hall of Fame in 1993. His co-author is Larry Parr, a former Editor of Chess Life (1984-1988). Mr Parr has received more individual awards for excellence from the Chess Journalists of America than any other chess writer.
Grandmaster Arnold Denker is known as the Grand Old Man of American Chess. In this memoir, GM Denker - who was U.S. chess champion from 1944 to 1946 - skillfully intertwines with his own life the stories of great chess men whom he knew and loved. Denker, who is renowned as a chess raconteur, was inducted into the U.S. Chess Hall of Fame in 1993. His co-author is Larry Parr, a former Editor of Chess Life (1984-1988). Mr Parr has received more individual awards for excellence from the Chess Journalists of America than any other chess writer.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
3 reviews
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful
The Boswell of American chess
24 May 2008
Format:Paperback
The term "must read" is overused in book blurbs but this book is a must read for anyone who loves chess and is interested in its history, especially in its golden age of the 1930s and 1940s. Denker chronicles the doings and depicts the quirks and mannerisms of giants like Alexander Alehkine, Max Euwe, Isaac Kashdan, Fred Reinfeld, Reuben Fine, Sammy Reshevsky, and--of course--himself (but in a thoroughly self-effacing manner). Denker knew them all and they knew him. With selected games highlighting the Boswellian depiction of some of caissa's most colorful personalities, Denker's narrative earns its place in a patzer's library both as a biography and as a game collection. Reading about life at the Manhattan Chess Club in the early 20th century can only make a reader nostalgic for a time before data bases and the need to memorize hundreds and thousands of openings. I own over three hundred chess books but if I had to narrow my collection down to only five or six, this would make the cut.
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful
Entertaining and informative
29 Jun 2005
Format:Paperback
The chess community is full of fascinating stories and anecdotes and every once in a while we are treated to entertaining and informative compilations of adventures on and off the chessboard. This year we have been treated to two exceptional volumes. The first, "The Bobby Fischer I knew and other stories" by Arnold Denker and Larry Parr contains over 300 pages of stories, photos and games from the American chess scene. The book contains a tremendous amount of material that I'm sure you've never seen anywhere else.
The most difficult aspect of putting together such a book is to avoid the all too frequent concentration on stories about people who really haven't had any impact on the game, but simply happened to have been around the chess scene for a long time. It isn't easy to diligently select only material that really is of some interest to the majority of readers. Legendary American Grandmaster Arnold Denker, who lived one of the longest and most productive chess lives, and former Chess Life editor Larry Parr have done a magnificent job of presenting fascinating material and unknown games that are entertaining and instructive. I wish they had been presented in algebraic notation, but that's the only small flaw I can find in this book, reprinted by the firm of Hardinge Simpole, whose mission is to " rescue from oblivion any worthwhile publication by the pen of an acknowledged master of chess writing"
I can't even begin to list the varied contents of this wonderful book, but if you have any interest in the American chess world, go out and buy it. It will give you countless hours of entertainment and you'll learn about many fascinating figures, both famous and obscure, and how they have enriched our chess history. Many of the games in this book are not in databases and I hope that they will eventually be entered into our collective chess encyclopedia. As for the stories, each and every one of them is worth telling, and you'll likely be able to use them to entertain people even if they aren't chessplayers.
The most difficult aspect of putting together such a book is to avoid the all too frequent concentration on stories about people who really haven't had any impact on the game, but simply happened to have been around the chess scene for a long time. It isn't easy to diligently select only material that really is of some interest to the majority of readers. Legendary American Grandmaster Arnold Denker, who lived one of the longest and most productive chess lives, and former Chess Life editor Larry Parr have done a magnificent job of presenting fascinating material and unknown games that are entertaining and instructive. I wish they had been presented in algebraic notation, but that's the only small flaw I can find in this book, reprinted by the firm of Hardinge Simpole, whose mission is to " rescue from oblivion any worthwhile publication by the pen of an acknowledged master of chess writing"
I can't even begin to list the varied contents of this wonderful book, but if you have any interest in the American chess world, go out and buy it. It will give you countless hours of entertainment and you'll learn about many fascinating figures, both famous and obscure, and how they have enriched our chess history. Many of the games in this book are not in databases and I hope that they will eventually be entered into our collective chess encyclopedia. As for the stories, each and every one of them is worth telling, and you'll likely be able to use them to entertain people even if they aren't chessplayers.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Synopsis
9 July 2007
Format:Paperback
This Damon Runyon-like work will be around well into the Twenty-first Century to inform future chess generations about such greats as Bobby Fischer and world champion Gary Kasparov as well as the "guys and dolls" of the New York chess scene during the fabled Golden Era of the 1930s and 1940s. In the Introduction, five-time U.S. Champion Larry Evans writes that the authors capture "some of the most raucous and colorful figures in 20th Century chess" with a "Dickensian precision." Yet there is plenty of hard chess in this big book - over 300 games and positions, many never before published, and which contain interesting opening ideas that have either been forgotten or neglected in the manuals.
Grandmaster Arnold Denker is known as the Grand Old Man of American Chess. In this memoir, GM Denker - who was U.S. chess champion from 1944 to 1946 - skillfully intertwines with his own life the stories of great chess men whom he knew and loved. Denker, who is renowned as a chess raconteur, was inducted into the U.S. Chess Hall of Fame in 1993. His co-author is Larry Parr, a former Editor of Chess Life (1984-1988). Mr Parr has received more individual awards for excellence from the Chess Journalists of America than any other chess writer.
Grandmaster Arnold Denker is known as the Grand Old Man of American Chess. In this memoir, GM Denker - who was U.S. chess champion from 1944 to 1946 - skillfully intertwines with his own life the stories of great chess men whom he knew and loved. Denker, who is renowned as a chess raconteur, was inducted into the U.S. Chess Hall of Fame in 1993. His co-author is Larry Parr, a former Editor of Chess Life (1984-1988). Mr Parr has received more individual awards for excellence from the Chess Journalists of America than any other chess writer.
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