I had the opportunity to study Simple Chess by Michael Stean this week. I wanted to write a quick review to note, that while I think this book will serve well for beginners, as an intermediate player I found it far too simplistic.
It did not have too many key insights that I did not already know. Most of the concepts outlined I already knew about. After finishing it, I am left confused on whether there really is nothing more to chess and it is in fact that simple. It can't all be about outposts, weak pawns, open files, semi open files, weak squares and small space advatanges, can it?
Maybe it can... maybe I've learned enough about chess now and all I am lacking is the discipline of perfect execution. It's logical, most things in life are simple. Kicking a ball playing football is simple... however, to become a professional you have to perfect the execution every time you kick the ball. Maybe it is the same in chess? I have to perfect every pawn push and every piece move to obey these basic principles and Voila!
We'll see.
It did not have too many key insights that I did not already know. Most of the concepts outlined I already knew about. After finishing it, I am left confused on whether there really is nothing more to chess and it is in fact that simple. It can't all be about outposts, weak pawns, open files, semi open files, weak squares and small space advatanges, can it?
Maybe it can... maybe I've learned enough about chess now and all I am lacking is the discipline of perfect execution. It's logical, most things in life are simple. Kicking a ball playing football is simple... however, to become a professional you have to perfect the execution every time you kick the ball. Maybe it is the same in chess? I have to perfect every pawn push and every piece move to obey these basic principles and Voila!
We'll see.
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