My Secrets in the Ruy Lopez

En forfriskende bok om å spille Spansk, og aller mest fra svarts side, forfattet av legendariske Lajos Portisch (født 1937!) som var VM-kandidat 8 ganger. Portisch var kjent for dype åpningsanalyser og ble kalt den "ungarske Botvinnik".

Boka har til og med aktuelle partier fra 2016, men mange av partiene er fra Portisch sin egen epoke i verdenseliten fra 60-tallet til 90-tallet, og han har selv Spansk-partier med svart i boka mot blant andre verdensmesterne Tal, Spasskij, Fischer og Karpov.

Det er en systematisk og ryddig bok uten for mange lange varianter, og med leseverdige kommentarer og innledninger som også inneholder litt sjakkhistorisk stoff om blant annet møtene hans med Bobby Fischer på og utenfor sjakkbrettet fram til 90-tallet i Budapest.

Som undertittel på omslaget har boka teksten "Unpublished ideas and analysis from decades of elite-level chess".

Stormester Imre Hera har bistått Portisch med blant annet å sjekke både gamle og nye partier med moderne computeranalyser.

Forlagets omtale:

It’s major news when a legendary player reveals his opening secrets. And when he has rarely written about his games or preparation methods, and was famous for meticulous, ahead-of-his-time opening analysis, it makes it a true publishing event.

Yet that is what eight-time world championship candidate Lajos Portisch has done. In this book, he opens his extensive opening files and presents the most important games and unused novelties in the Ruy Lopez (or Spanish Game). He also explains the strategies and ideas behind these lines, and places the key games in their historical settings. Anecdotes abound, as do reflections on his key rivals, including Fischer, Karpov, Tal, Larsen and Smyslov.

This is also a thoroughly modern work. As well as drawing upon games from his own long career, Portisch includes important Ruy Lopez games by modern champions, including Anand and Carlsen, describing them from his own unique perspective. All analysis has been computer-verified, with Portisch’s hand-made variations standing up to scrutiny in most cases, but with the computer adding new and surprising twists. Thus we see how human creativity can remain a vital component in modern preparation.

Lajos Portisch is one of the greatest players of the modern era. An elite player from the 1960s to the 1990s, he qualified for the candidates eight times and was board 1 for the Hungary team that won olympic gold in 1978, ahead of the USSR. He is one of the 12 Hungarian ‘Sportsmen of the Nation’ – the country’s highest sporting honour.