Melekhin, Aleksandr
Description
Before moving on to a detailed consideration of Chess Strategy, we would like to briefly discuss one cultural event that strongly influenced the view
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and depiction of a wide range of the world public on chess.
So, at the end of 2020, TV viewers in more than 60 countries watched with keen interest the Netflix’s chess drama "The Queen's Gambit" of 7 episodes, based on the novel of the same name by Walter Stone Tevis (1983).
Many leading critics of the media noted that after the release of this 7-episode drama, public interest in chess was explosive. It can only be compared with the chess mania that prevailed after Bobby Fischer beat Boris Spassky to become World Chess Champion in 1972.
The striking effect of “The Queen's Gambit" on the audience, from our point of view, lies in the vibrant intrigue that the authors of the mini-series put before the fictional character, an orphan chess prodigy, Elizabeth (Beth) Harmon.
Right from the start, 9-year-old Elizabeth was put into the desperate, oppressive, and domineering environment of a religious girls' orphanage (Methuen Home for Girls). It is obvious that only an individual with an iron strong-willed character is able to break out of such depressing hopeless circumstances, achieve social recognition, and at the same time not lose her human dignity.
Due to the emerging circumstances, Beth set herself a difficult-to-achieve goal and chooses chess as a universal vessel for escape from such a ominous space. TV viewers are watching with undisguised interest the fascinating process of transforming a beginner into an elite chess player, Elizabeth Harmon, defeating the strongest opponents one after another.
Many other movies and TV series have shown miraculous victories of various chess players over stronger opponents before. However, all these works of movie and television art reflected chess victories as the result of some mystical phenomena and patterns. Wherein, it was very difficult for a wide range of viewers to identify themselves with the chess characters of such art-works and the unnatural situations in which these characters found themselves.
A remarkable feature of “The Queen's Gambit" is the minimization of mysticism in achieving victory in chess and at the same time demonstrating the real possible circumstances that arise in actual chess life; in other words, we can observe the expressed predominance of realism over mysticism.
The true realism of "The Queen's Gambit" drama lies in the facts that its authors and performers very vividly and clearly show the processes of overcoming two varieties of harsh circumstances that are absolutely necessary to achieve hard-to-reach goals in chess: 1) Taking away all kinds of barriers and obstacles; as well as 2) Using the necessary resources for this.
Now it becomes clearer to us the significant difficulties that a chess player must overcome in order to achieve victory over strong opponents. The road to chess victory is littered with thorns, full of traps and tangled labyrinths, and contains many dead-end paths.
Unfortunately, most chess players do not use Chess Strategy, or use it in a limited or distorted version. Their path to victory consists of lengthy trial and error, frequent frustrations, high financial costs, and often ends up stopping the study and practice of chess.
In this regard, the main task of this book is to define the modern concept of Chess Strategy, as well as to give a detailed and comprehensive analysis of it.
This, from our point of view, should improve our understanding of chess victory, as well as a full-fledged understanding of chess in general.
We would like to wish our readers as chess players and their teams, as well as to all booklovers interested in Chess Strategy, great success towards progress in deepening your knowledge of chess.
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