"Hyperbole is the use of exaggeration as a rhetorical device or figure of speech. In rhetoric, it is also sometimes known as auxesis. In poetry and oratory, it emphasizes, evokes strong feelings, and creates strong impressions. As a figure of speech, it is usually not meant to be taken literally." (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperbole)
Yes, absolutely correct, I used hyperbole :)
I kind of want to truncate my response to the above. I will respond in more detail, not to be defensive, but because perhaps there is a misunderstanding that can be rectified here. This expressive passage was not meant to convey hubris.
I genuinely have yet to find a text which comprehensively introduces the game in a fun way, as mine does. You will see in other comments that folks often have chess sets lying around, but they struggle to engage those around them or teach the game engagingly. The tone of that paragraph is born from a very real, very modern, and very frustrating experience.
Most books that "teach" chess are things like My System, which presumes some familiarity with the game and its rules, and is also just super dry. Josh Waitzkin's Attacking Chess was great as an intro to tactics, but not to the piece movements or chess itself as a whole. There are no other resources I have seen which effectively employ minigames, except perhaps IM Herman Grooten's recommended "Steps Method" (https://www.stappenmethode.nl/en/). After speaking with IM Grooten, I decided that their approach, while great for the classroom and extremely comprehensive, is not encapsulated in a form that non-chess instructors would find worth paging through and implementing in their lives or with their loved ones.
As an aside, I think Lucena's book was written so long ago that some of the rules (pawn double-step, en passant, long-range queen movement, castling) may not have been the same. I haven't read it, and I don't know anyone who has, so I can't say for sure. Wikipedia hints at this.
I really can't say where the counterexample is, because I haven't found good introductory teaching. Lichess has great learning modules, which can take someone from zero knowledge to decent player in a great engaging way. But that's not well-explained to a parent or beginner who isn't quite self-motivated to dig through hardcore chess stuff on their own.
For those in the autodidact demographic, my book is irrelevant for sure, and perhaps that includes you. Other resources those folks might find more useful (the kind who want lists of source material instead of some hubristic author opining) I have listed here: https://andytrattner.com/chess
Thanks, amazing, yes please make interactive things!! I always wanted to turn this into a site and put more of them, but my limited programming patience only led to a basic diagram generator (http://andytrattner.com/chessboard/) for the written page :(
Different configurations to hop knights around are great. I recall https://acornchess.com/ has some more of these. They didn't have cloud-based stuff nor social / leaderboards if I recall, it was all local desktop and behind paywall. The opportunity is there to create better things!
AWESOME!!! YES!!!! It's all about the most simple structures.
There is a flaw in the B+R minigame, which is that perfect play leads to a draw, or rather people playing forever and getting board because they don't yet know the 50-move rule...
Although apt adults will quickly realize the optimal approach, many will still get pieces captured, so someone will win and lose, and they can play again until they realize the optimal approach. Then it's time to move on to the next minigame!
I still haven't figured out if Pawn Wars resolves to a zugzwang situation based on who moves first. And King Opposition took a while for me to grok, even though I knew how to queen a pawn. Interesting to think about all these things, even if the conclusion is predetermined.
Playing on the internet can be a chess killer and a mind-number. Since 2014 I have been almost purely been "wasting my time" on 3+2 and shorter blitz without much improvement. The glory days for me were 2012-2013, when I could set aside a full day and play in G45 or G60 Saturday Swiss at the Portland Chess Club.
15+15 sounds great but you can also go for 30 or 45 or 60 minute games online! Even if not in person, with those time controls at the low end of classical, you will find yourself thinking more deeply to re-wire bad habits. The mistakes will have more investment behind them, so you will tend to review the games and learn/internalize from them more. Especially if you find a good sparring partner, or set the rating range -0 +500, and only play people who are better than you. I'm on Lichess if you like: https://lichess.org/@/andytratt :)
I disagree a bit with correspondence because I think few people are wired to take it seriously. I've been doing correspondence Go and some days I just make a move because I'm busy with other things, so it really has to be a priority over a long time period. Also, I tried Diplomacy a couple times last year with various groups (https://www.backstabbr.com/) and found that it's a rare breed of human who, even in hacker demographics, can focus on such correspondence activities to my (very minimal) level.
YES. This is the point of the book! Chess rule absorption is quite a painful, boring process for most people. It can take a very long time, especially for children and/or folks who are not intrinsically motivated but being forced to learn to indulge a family member, friend, or something.
Ideally the learning process can be both fun and high-utility, through minigames and the other activities laid out in the book! It took me 3+ weeks of multiple hour-long classes each week to get a classroom of smart 4th graders to absorb the knight movements and play Knight Battleship competently. In the end, they did enjoy it... and once they felt mastery, they wanted to learn more.
It always struck me as strange, among the many chess shelves in the Mechanics Institute and elsewhere, that there wasn't such a starter book out there already...I'm very pleased to hear it stacks up well against your hundreds!
People are definitely surprised when they blunder mate in one. But after it happens and the pieces are knocked to the floor, perhaps seeing what you did wrong and understanding it quickly is a feature of the game rather than a bug. This allows faster learning cycles, a feeling of mastery, and progress towards the 2000+ level. Don't forget the competitive dynamic too. Can you learn faster and do better over time than your opponents? This is motivating to many. I certainly enjoyed improving rapidly vs my peers in high school.
I would add that, having now reached 2000+ myself years ago, the same punishing tactical dynamics apply at master level and it's harder to continuously make progress. At some point all chess players turn to other activities, often ones that are more creative, because chess does become repetitive in the confines of the 64 squares. Of course, it's still near-infinitely variable, but the contours of games and the player's progress within them are somehow bounded. Within the last year, I've made a serious effort to switch to Go.
Chess really isn't for everyone always, and as AlphaZero shows, it may not be for any one either... us mere mortals will struggle along, occasionally indulging in puzzle brain crack, and sometimes making meaning out of the journey. In the right context, it can be enjoyable too.
The conclusion of the book states that rather than being viewed as unilaterally boring, I hope chess can be respected and appreciated by all, just like chocolate. You don't have to personally like chocolate, but that doesn't mean it's intrinsically bad, and many people do like it :)
Yes, absolutely correct, I used hyperbole :)
I kind of want to truncate my response to the above. I will respond in more detail, not to be defensive, but because perhaps there is a misunderstanding that can be rectified here. This expressive passage was not meant to convey hubris.
I genuinely have yet to find a text which comprehensively introduces the game in a fun way, as mine does. You will see in other comments that folks often have chess sets lying around, but they struggle to engage those around them or teach the game engagingly. The tone of that paragraph is born from a very real, very modern, and very frustrating experience.
Most books that "teach" chess are things like My System, which presumes some familiarity with the game and its rules, and is also just super dry. Josh Waitzkin's Attacking Chess was great as an intro to tactics, but not to the piece movements or chess itself as a whole. There are no other resources I have seen which effectively employ minigames, except perhaps IM Herman Grooten's recommended "Steps Method" (https://www.stappenmethode.nl/en/). After speaking with IM Grooten, I decided that their approach, while great for the classroom and extremely comprehensive, is not encapsulated in a form that non-chess instructors would find worth paging through and implementing in their lives or with their loved ones.
As an aside, I think Lucena's book was written so long ago that some of the rules (pawn double-step, en passant, long-range queen movement, castling) may not have been the same. I haven't read it, and I don't know anyone who has, so I can't say for sure. Wikipedia hints at this.
I really can't say where the counterexample is, because I haven't found good introductory teaching. Lichess has great learning modules, which can take someone from zero knowledge to decent player in a great engaging way. But that's not well-explained to a parent or beginner who isn't quite self-motivated to dig through hardcore chess stuff on their own.
For those in the autodidact demographic, my book is irrelevant for sure, and perhaps that includes you. Other resources those folks might find more useful (the kind who want lists of source material instead of some hubristic author opining) I have listed here: https://andytrattner.com/chess