Warriors of the Mind: A Quest for the Supreme Genius of the Chess Board

by Raymond D. Keene, Nathan Divinsky

Would Garry Kasparov have beaten Bobby Fischer? Was Capablanca stronger than Morphy? Many chess authors have speculated about such questions, but this book, based on a sophisticated computer analysis undertaken at the University of British Columbia, provides the definitive answer

Genres: Chess

339 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1989

Reviews

[Thomas Ray]

Cited by Mark E. Glickman in his paper, "A Comprehensive Guide to Chess Ratings," p. 6 of 49.
glicko.net/research/acjpaper.pdf
I've reviewed Glickman's paper as a comment to my review of Elo's book:
goodreads.com/review/show/2060648624

[Liquidlasagna · Rating 2 out of 5]

I think the book is an interestingly curious hunk of crap

After considerable pondering, i think what was done was to tackle a relatively easy grid of top players against other top players, and I think a far, far more interesting picture is by looking at historical Elo ratings and the graphs of the top 25 players rising and falling year by year...

Now that would be a great book, with colored lines, of seeing Zukertort's rise and collapse, and oh heck everyone else....

Anyhoo, i think all the scientism and bias are in spades here, and the only thing this shows you is nothing more than who the most CONSISTENT chess masters were...

nothing more, nothing less!

Edward Winter and I think Ken Smith and Hugh Myers, had this feeling that it was just hype to promote Kasparov over Karpov.

For my money, you're better off making your own lists of the Top Elo Rated players in every 25 year time span, and get this book for a dollar, just for the highly amusing, and somewhat crappy writing.

If you love Lasker and Kasparov and want to feel good about yourself, get this book.

I found making my own list far more interesting
- seven columns of different eras of chess players -
- Elo Numbers along the side -
1800 to 1824 [Column I - chess players born in this era]
1825 to 1849 [Column II]
1850 to 1874 [Column III]
1875 to 1899 [Column IV]
1900 to 1924 [Column V]
1925 to 1949 [Column VI]
1950 to 1974 [Column VII]

......

Even just looking at the best Elo ratings of a certain year i think is waaaaaaaay more fascinating than the dull consistency list of the top 64 Grandmasters of the Century!

Take 1967

1 Spassky-Fischer
2 Petrossian
3 Bottvinnik-Tal
4 Stein
5 Geller
6 Korchnoi-Polugaevsky-Larsen-Portisch
7 Keres-Smyslov
8 Taimanov
9 Kholmov-Lutikov-Unzicker-Uhlmann
10 Boleslavsky-Bronstein-Foorman-Gipslis-Reshevsky-Najdorf-Hort
11 Savon-Vasyukov-Benko-Gligoric-Ivkov
12 Averbakh-Suetin-Evans
13 Olafsson
14 Antoshin-Lein-Ney-Byrne-Pachman
15 Krogius-Liberzon-Filip-Lombardy-Matanovic-Szabo-Panno-Matulovic-Pomar

[now that is a fun list!]