McCreadyandChess

Greetings from a flooded Bangkok. Cut off from most of the city unless I am prepared to wade through toxic, crocodile invested gunk for hours, whilst having to inure myself to various forms of mockery from the locals; a life of seclusion, of downloading, uploading, documentary watching -whilst cooking noodles I might add- and of course, studying chess have been inflicted upon me.

It’s actually a great opportunity to catch up on literature that has been put aside. There are now 35 books that I have in my personal collection, about 10 of which I have already read. I’m going to study Yuri Avebakh’s Comprehensive Chess Endings and focus on the Queen’s Indian Defence by Soltis and Keene. I also plan to look at Nigel Davies’s The Power Chess Programme and Basman’s St. George’s Defence. Having performed poorly over the board recently, I don’t miss playing with friends, especially since I am not a fan of blitz. Instead I intend to use this solitude to refocus, to re-examine where I have recently gone wrong. Furthermore, I am still broadening my opening repertoire so that when I come to focus on study of the middle-game, I will have a better idea of which positions and games I should focus on. Studying the middle-game is much harder than it appears. I’m trying to tailor my study of the middle-game so that it is inclusive of the positional and tactical elements I am most likely to encounter. Take for example, Andrew Soltis’s book Pawn Structure chess. I decided not to read it all because 1) I don’t play d4, 2) I don’t play the Kings Indian Defence. Anyway, back to the chess board.

More later.

A few days in…

I managed to get hold of John Watson’s Chess Strategy in Action and am enjoying it very much. I really enjoy books that offer a historical perspective, and this one’s no different. Watson appears to be more educated and a better writer than your average GM, so its a good read. On another positive note, the water has gone down about 1 foot.

A few more days in…

Excuse my French but the flood is really beginning to pee me off. I’ve put on almost half a stone now through having to sit inside all the time. As wonderful as chess is, I doubt whether it can save my sanity if this goes on for much longer. The word on the river street is that it will take another two months for everything to get back to normal. Great. On the chess front. Watson has taken over. I’m enjoying his book greatly, particularly his exposition on The Tartakower line in the QGD. He gives some instructive games, including some amazing stuff by Nigel Short.