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A Keenesian Rehash
Book by Brian Almeida
Reviews Kasparov on Kasparov, Part II: 1985-1993 by Garry Kasparov, Everyman
Chess 2013, Hardcover, Figurine Algebraic Notation, 495pp. $45.00; Ebook
$31.95

This second volume of Kasparov's autobiographical trilogy contains one

Kasparov on Kasparov,
hundred of his most memorable games and endings played during the eight
Part 1: 1973-1985 (Ebook)
Translate this page years when he was FIDE world champion. Kasparov describes this period as by Garry Kasparov
the peak of his career, which he asserts is confirmed by his competitive results
and the quality of the games. It was during this time that he achieved a then
all-time high rating of 2805 (in November 1989), and up until Linares 1991 he
won or shared first place in all the tournaments in which he participated, he
also defended the world championship title in matches with Karpov in 1986,
1987, and 1990. The volume ends with his win in Linares 1993 just prior to
the match with Short.

The main content is divided as follows:

Foreword
Match after Match
At the Peak of my Career
Kasparov vs Karpov
Rating Chart Fall and Rise
1988-2009 (Ebook)
Index of Openings by Garry Kasparov
Awful – Index of Games

Utter rubbish Note that this volume offers Kasparov's most memorable games rather than his
best games from this period. Indicative of this difference is the inclusion of
Poor –
the following game, in which Kasparov's vaunted opening preparation is

Inferior shown to have some holes. The game is also interesting because the sacrifice
of the rook on a1 is similar to Game Ten from the 1995 World Championship.
Uneven – Kasparov writes, "I, in my first duel with the future world champion Vishy
Anand, was ready to employ some lethal opening preparation." However,

Mix of good and bad
Kasparov overlooked something.
Good –
The game is provided with select notes:

Worth buying
Kasparov-Short, 1993 (Ebook)
Kasparov, G – Anand, V by ChessCafe
Great –
Linares (11), 11.03.1991

Above and beyond average

Petroff Defence [C43]

Excellent – 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.d4 Nxe4 4.Bd3 d5 5.Nxe5 Bd6

Everyone should own This sharp plan, developed by Makarychev, Dvoretsky and his pupil
Yusupov, was for a long time the main line, but from the spring of 1992
it almost disappeared from serious practice, giving way to the plans with
5...Nd7 (Game No.95).

6.0-0 0-0 7.c4 Bxe5 8.dxe5 Nc6 9.cxd5 Qxd5 10.Qc2 Nb4 11.Bxe4 Nxc2
12.Bxd5 Bf5 13.g4 Bxg4 14.Be4 Nxa1

[FEN "r4rk1/ppp2ppp/8/4P3/4B1b1/

8/PP3P1P/nNB2RK1 w - - 0 15"]

Black has won the exchange, but his knight is in danger, and he hopes to
maintain the balance by returning his extra material at the right time.

15.Bf4!

The weaker 15.Nc3 allows Black to equalise by 15...Bh3 (or immediately

15...f5, Makarychev-Karpov, Oslo 1984) 16.Re1 f5 17.exf6 Rae8!
intending ...Rxe4 and ...Nc2 (Tal-Karpov, Milan 1975).

15...f5 16.Bd5+! Kh8 17.Rc1 c6 18.Bg2! Rfd8 19.Nd2!

[FEN "r2r3k/pp4pp/2p5/4Pp2/5Bb1/

8/PP1N1PBP/n1R3K1 b - - 0 19"]

I studied the well-known variation 19.Nd2 h6 20.h4 Rd3 (Rozentalis-

Gelfand, Vilnius 1988) before the 1990 match, and my assistant Sergey
Dolmatov (also a pupil of Dvoretsky) found the good set-up with
21.Bf1! followed by the sacrifice of the e5-pawn in order to occupy this
square with the knight. The strength of this idea was demonstrated a year
later in Timman-Yusupov (6th match game, Linares 1992): after
21...Rd4 22.Be3 Rd5 23.Rxa1 (Yusupov and Dvoretsky had only looked
at 23.f4; 23.f3; or 23.e6) 23...Rxe5 24.Nc4 White gained an enduring
advantage and scored an important win.

I wanted to catch Anand with this novelty, but an unpleasant surprise

awaited me.

19...Rxd2!?

Vishy chose a line mentioned by Rozentalis in his

Informator notes to his
game with Gelfand. Strangely enough, in our analysis we had not even
considered this possibility.

20.Bxd2 Rd8 21.Bc3!

Later it transpired that after 21.Be3 Rd1+ 22.Rxd1 Bxd1 23.Bxa7 Nc2
the most probable outcome is a draw.

21...Rd1+ 22.Rxd1 Bxd1


[FEN "7k/pp4pp/2p5/4Pp2/8/2B5/

PP3PBP/n2b2K1 w - - 0 23"]

23.f4?

Alas, at the board I failed to find the correct 23.Bf1! (the end of
Rozentalis's variation with the evaluation 'clear advantage to White'),
which was later studied in detail in correspondence tournaments. After
23...Kg8 24.Bc4+ Kf8 25.b4 Nc2 26.Bb3! Black would have faced a
very difficult defence.

23...Nc2 24.Kf2 Kg8 25.a4 a5! 26.Bxa5 Nd4 27.Bf1 Bb3 ½-½

The competitive significance of this game was enormous: by not winning

it, I also failed to win the tournament.

Kasparov comments that this would be the first tournament since Tilburg 1981
in which he did not win or share first place. Yet it was only some months
earlier that he fled Baku on a midnight private flight to Moscow with his
family to avoid the Armenian pogroms. Following the game is a reprint of an
article published in the newspaper
Moscow News in which Kasparov outlines
his political beliefs and the impetus on the world champion to speak out on
worldly matters.

Speaking of reprints, this volume contains twenty-eight (!) games (including

four fragments) against Karpov. Perhaps Kasparov found them most
memorable because he had only just finished a three-volume compendium of
all his games against Karpov. Were his most memorable moments so scarce
during the peak of his career that he had to resort to reproducing nearly thirty
percent of the content. This shows an unconscionable disregard to the
readership by both the author and the publisher.

Yet curiously there are deviations in the annotations between the two books.
Comments have been added or deleted, major lines of analysis deleted, and
the placement of diagrams is also often different. It makes one wonder
whether Ray Keene was the ghost-writer on this particular series.

Here is just one small example:

From Kasparov on Kasparov, Part II: 1985-1993:

In the 10th round, which was played after a rest day, my 162nd encounter
with Karpov took place – a genuine battle for the lead. My eternal
opponent came on to the stage in a very determined mood, but that
evening I was on form and something unforeseen occurred, astounding

the participants, the spectators, and the entire chess world.

Game 98
A. Karpov-G. Kasparov

Linares, 10th Round 09.03.1993

King's Indian Defence E86

1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 Bg7 4.e4 d6 5.f3 0-0 6.Be3 e5

6...Nbd7 – Game No.68; 6...a6 – Game No.91.

7.Nge2

Karpov made this move quickly – in the 8th round he had used it to
 defeat Kamsky, although before this for many years he played only 7.d5.
Here I wanted to surprise my opponent with a sacrifice of two pawns:
7...Nh5 (7...c6 – Game Nos. 43, 92) 8.Qd2 f5 9.0-0-0 Nd7 10.Bd3 Nf4?!
(instead of the usual 10...Nc5 – Game No.84) 11.Bxf4 exf4 12.exf5 Ne5
13.fxg6 Nxd3+ 14.Qxd3 Bf5 15.gxh7+ Bxh7, and here we looked at
16.Qd2 (16.Ne4!?) 16...c5 17.Nge2 b5. In the computer age such play
looks crazy, but from the human point of view it is very interesting and
unusual.

7...c6 8.Qd2 Nbd7

[With a diagram here.]

9.Rd1

A rare and objectively second-rate move. 9.d5 or 9.0-0-0 (Game No.90)

are more aggressive. Being well familiar with my style, in this important
game Karpov wanted to exclude risk and sharpness, and therefore he
chose a set-up that was quiet, but not without venom. However, there

was something he failed to take into account.

From Kasparov vs. Karpov, 1988-2009:

In the 10th round, which was played after a rest day, my 162nd encounter
with Karpov took place – a genuine battle for the lead. My eternal
opponent came into the stage in a very determined mood, but that
evening I was on form and something unforeseen occurred, astounding

the participants, the spectators, and the entire chess world.

Game 38
A. Karpov-G. Kasparov

Linares 1993, 10th round

King's Indian Defence E86

1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 Bg7 4.e4 d6 5.f3

5.Nf3 0-0 6.Be2 e5 7.Be3 exd4 8.Nxd4 Re8 9.f3 c6 10.Bf2 d5 11.exd5
cxd5 12.0-0 Nc6 13.c5 – cf. Game No.18, note to White's 10th move.

5...0-0 6.Be3 e5

6...c6 – Game No.8.

7.Nge2

Karpov made this move quickly – in the 8th round he had used it to
defeat Kamsky, although before this for many years he played only 7.d5
(Game Nos.28, 30, 36). Here I wanted to surprise my opponent with a
sacrifice of two pawns: 7...Nh5 8.Qd2 f5 9.0-0-0 Nd7 10.Bd3 Nf4?!

(instead of the usual 10...Nc5 11.Bc2 a6 12.Nge2 b5, J.Timman-
G.Kasparov, Linares 1992) 11.Bxf4 exf4 12.exf5 Ne5 13.fxg6 Nxd3+
14.Qxd3 Bf5 15.gxh7+ Bxh7, and here we looked at 16.Qd2 (16.Ne4!?)
16...c5 17.Nge2 b5. In the computer age such play looks crazy, but from
the human point of view it is very interesting and unusual.

[With a diagram here.]

7...c6

It is premature to play 7...exd4 8.Nxd4 c6 9.Be2 d5 10.exd5 cxd5 11.0-0

Nc6 12.c5 with somewhat the better chances for White (A.Karpov-
M.Dvoretsky, Tula 1967): if 12...Re8, then 13.Bf2! – an unexpected
transformation of the Sämisch into one of the tabiyas of the 5 Nf3
variation (see above) (but not 13.Qd2 Rxe3!?, as in the 11th game of the
1990 match.)

8.Qd2 Nbd7

Now after 8...exd4 Black has to reckon with both 9.Bxd4 (and 9.Nxd4 d5
10.exd5 cxd5 11.0-0-0!?, L.Portisch-S.Gligoric, Sousse Interzonal

1967.)
9.Rd1

A rare and objectively second-rate move. The afore-mentioned Karpov-

Kamsky game went 9.d5 cxd5 10.cxd5 a6 11.g4! b5?! 12.Ng3 Nc5 13.b4
with advantage to White, but, of course, I would have replied 11...h5!
(cf. Game No.36, note to White's 8th move).

9.0-0-0 a6 is more interesting, with the idea of 10.dxe5 Nxe5! (as played
long ago by Geller, and then also by Timman), while if 10.h4, then
10...h5 or 10...b5 (A.Beliavsky-J.Timman, Linares 1991.) In Linares
1993 other continuations were tried against me:

1) 10.Kb1 b5 11.Nc1 (later the sharp 11.c5!? became more topical)

11...exd4! 12.Bxd4 b4! (instead of 12...Re8, A.Shirov-G.Kasparov,

Dortmund 1992) 13.Na4 c5 14.Bxf6 Bxf6 15.Qxd6 Be7! 16.Qg3 Bh4
17.Qh3 Be7 18.Qg3 Bh4 19.Qh3 ½-½ (V.Kramnik-G.Kasparov, 4th
round);

2) 10.Bh6 Bxh6! 11.Qxh6 b5 12.h4 Qa5! with a quick draw after a lively
battle (A.Beliavsky-G.Kasparov, 8th round).

Being well familiar with my style, in this important game Karpov wanted
to exclude risk and sharpness, and therefore he chose a set-up that was
quiet, but not without venom. However, there was something he failed to
take into account.

Kasparov writes in the foreword, "From the early 1990s talented young players
began assuming the leading roles in chess" and includes Anand, Ivanchuk,
Gelfand, Short, Kamsky, Shirov, and Topalov as examples. He provides
games against all of them (twenty in all), except Topalov, who he first played
in 1994. The reader would have been better served with twenty-eight further
examples against the up-and-coming talents rather than with a rehash of
Karpov games. This volume would be exceptional if that were the case. It is
still highly recommended; it is Kasparov after all. Nevertheless, the
duplication of content is a blemish on the entire series.

My assessment of this product:

Order Kasparov on Kasparov, Part II: 1985-1993 (Ebook)

by Garry Kasparov

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