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The Chess Mind.
Gerald Abrahams.
Penguin.
1960.
First published by English Universities Press 1951.
346 pp.
Descriptive notation.
Gerald Abrahams (1907-1980) was, like Dr. Tarrasch, a true amateur. If he didn't approach the "Praeceptor Germaniae" in strength, still he was one of the best British players of his day. The Chess Mind is Abrahams' most significant chess book.
In Part One, he examines Varieties of Mental Activity in Chess:
In Part Two, The Chess Mind in Action, he presents 47 illustrative games (35 in the first edition). The selection of games is good, and decently albeit quite sparsely annotated. The games are well connected to the text, with many positions discussed therein later appearing again as part of a complete game, whereby one gains in depth of understanding by seeing how they arose and (where there is no immediate decision) where they led.
Abrahams' philosophical extrapolations from chess are tendentious, especially now that computers have proved that chess can be played well by pure calculation after all, and is thus a mechanical activity — or at least an activity that can be emulated by machines, rather as running a four-minute mile can be emulated by a car. Abrahams doesn't have Tarrasch's didactic gift, which makes this and other of his books not well-suited as learning aids (I say "learning aids" because of course essentially one teaches chess to oneself). He can be pompous, and writes a ponderous, old-fashioned prose; but both are worth bearing with. For its time, this was a unique book, and it remains worth reading.
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