April 2003
Thoughts from a Grandmaster
Date: April 5, 2003
Subject: Theory vs. practice
Things always look different when you're at the board. I've lost
count of the number of times I've cooked up some idea at home only
to see the drawbacks when I think about playing it in a real game.
The problem with a live opponent is that he has a vested interest in
destroying our ideas. We, on the other hand, have a vested interest
in seeing them work so we can admire our own handiwork and
congratulate ourselves on being such clever chaps. Of course this
creates a tendency to overlook contradictory details....
So I've learned never to trust the views of an armchair theoretician
or the coach who can't or doesn’t play. Let them test their ideas against
real opponents after which we can assess the real level of their
understanding. Former World Champion Tigran Petrosian was once asked
what he thought about a particular position and his reply was very
illuminating: "When I knew the answer to that I up there playing
rather than down here watching."
Nigel Davies
Grandmaster
Southport, UK
* * *
Date: April 21, 2003
Subject: Abstraction
Chess problem composers are divided into three groups:
realists compose problems that resemble actual games, romantics execute
unusual ideas in realistic positions, abstractionists produce unusual
ideas in unusual positions. In 1936 Mikhail Botvinik called for a
"merciless fight" against abstract composition, analogous to the Soviet
crusade against abstract art. Here's the story in the Moscow Times.
http://www.themoscowtimes.com/stories/2003/04/18/099.html
Alix Martin
Trader
Paris
* * *
Date: April 22, 2003
This somewhat resembles the different facets of financial
research, and
the opposition of styles between ivory tower academics and empiricist
practitioners.
Alix Martin
Trader
Paris