Hello again, world! This spring is an exciting time for me, because it’s publication time for my new book, Did You Come Here to Play Chess or to Have Fun? If you live in Europe, the book was already published earlier this month. If you live in America, the official publication date is May 15, but you can pre-order a copy at Amazon.com already.
Yesterday Ben Johnson posted an interview with me on his Perpetual Chess podcast, where it is episode number 432. We recorded the interview last week. Ben is especially interested in chess improvement, so I shared with him my five steps to becoming a Life Master. I also told the story of my game with Walter Browne, when he got mad at me for accepting a draw offer that he had made. And I described my first meeting with the always controversial Hans Niemann, seven years before he became famous, and how he impressed me even then with his huge talent and work ethic.
These and many more interesting topics and stories are discussed in my book. As I told Ben, my goal was to accomplish something that is rarely achieved in the chess literature: a book that is both useful and fun to read. Most chess books are waaaay too high on the seriousness meter, with a fun quotient near zero. The answer to the question in the title is that you can do both. You can work seriously at chess but also enjoy doing it. One of the best ways is to build a chess community, and I share some practical advice on how to do that.
Listen to the podcast in audio-only format at Ben’s website, or watch the video on YouTube.
