Great Chess Upsets by Samuel Reshevsky

I was looking over this one the other day and can only say, it’s honest to goodness garbage.  First of all it’s pretty well known Reshevsky didn’t write most (if any) of the books attributed to him despite his claims otherwise. I doubt he wrote this one either and judging from some of the statements made in the book, Reshevsky’s memory was really bad or whoever wrote the book had a very limited knowledge of chess history. Even Reshevsky's chapter on himself has some inconsistencies.

The book is a collection of games by great players and is accompanied by brief biographical sketches.  There are seventeen players from Adolf Anderssen to Anatoly Karpov and includes all the world champions up to 1976.

In any case, most of the games hardly qualify as upsets. Seriously, who would consider Lasker losing to Rubinstein an upset?  Or Capablanca to Alekhine? And the book is full of such games.

 

I am appalled!

Careless editing is rampant.  For example, it seems the editor was not sure how spell ‘en prise’ because it is spelled several different ways.   One game is appears twice…Alekhine-Euwe from the World Championship match; the really funny thing is it has different notes.

Another stupid error…It says that Keres "still participates in numerous chess competitions and will probably continue to do so for many years." The book was printed in 1976 but Keres died in 1975. Also, I’ll bet you didn’t know Korchnoi got GM title in 1956 then the IM title in 1963. At least that’s what the book says.  What?  Did he get busted from GM to IM?  According to the book, "The height of Smyslov's career came in 1957 in the return match against Botvinnik.  The height of his career was losing the world championship?! Other stupid errors abound.

The chapter on Fischer does not mention his resigning his world title.  At the same time the book does mention the result of the Korchnoi-Karpov Candidates Match which was played after Fischer resigned. And no mention is made of FIDE declaring Karpov World Champion. I could go on, but won’t.

Save your money.  If you see it at the library, pass it up.