Gyula Breyer, The Chess Revolutionary

Et stort, flott verk om sjakkbegavelsen Gyula Breyer som døde i 1921 bare 28 år gammel. Han var en betdelig sjakktenker og rakk også noen resultater som viste spillestyrke blant de beste i verden, tross hjertesvakheten som kostet ham livet.

Det beste turneringsresultatet hans kom et snaut år før han døde. Berlin 4.-15. desember 1920:

Breyer 6 1/2 poeng, Tartakower og Bogoljubow 5 1/2, Reti 5, Mieses, Maroczy og Tarrasch 4 1/2, Sämisch 3 1/2, Leonhardt 3 og Spielmann 2 1/2.

Forlagets omtale:

Gyula Breyer (1893-1921) was a highly successful and imaginative chess player. He won the championship of his native country Hungary as a teenager and achieved remarkable results against the leading players of his day.

But first and foremost, Breyer was a revolutionary in his chess thinking. He promoted the idea of dynamic chess and formulated many of the Hypermodern concepts, long before others started their investigations. Yet, after his death, he was omitted from most of the chess history books and today is only known for the Breyer variation, an ever popular defence against the Ruy Lopez.

However, Jimmy Adams has now unlocked Breyer’s legacy from the archives and made it accessible to the chess world at large. This monumental book presents 240 of his games, annotated by Breyer himself and many others. It also features a large number of articles, columns and fragments from newspapers, magazines and books, sparkling with chess and literary wit. The majority appear in English for the first time – and indeed in any language other than Hungarian.

By piecing together this material in chronological order, Jimmy Adams has constructed a mesmerizing biography covering Gyula Breyer’s intense, unconventional and ultimately tragic life. Included as well is a collection of his chess problems, some of which are truly amazing.

GM Raymond Keene: “In terms of importance this book ranks at the top with Kasparov's ‎various mega series, Nimzowitsch's ‘My System’ and Alekhine's books of his best games. Games, notes, discreet modern corrections, scholarly research, history, theory and perhaps most impressive ‎of all, Breyer's Philosophy of the art, science and sport of chess!”

Innledningen til boka:

In the pages of chess history, Gyula Breyer (1893-1921) may justly be called an unsung hero. Though ranked with great players such as Alekhine, Réti, Nimzowitsch, Tartakower and Bogoljubow in the development of the hypermodern revolution, very little has been written in the English language about his life and work or indeed his extraordinary style of play.

Yet, paradoxically, his name is constantly mentioned by modern-day competitive players. This is due to the ongoing popularity of the Breyer Variation of the Ruy Lopez, in which Black makes a weird-looking knight retreat to its starting square as early as the ninth move. Also Breyer’s shock proclamation ‘After 1.e4 White’s game is in its last throes!’ is occasionally quoted, usually in jest. But perhaps none of this should come as a surprise, since Breyer made outlandish moves and controversial statements throughout his chess career