Book Reviews

Psych-Out
Bill Kelleher

Chess Psychology, by Angus Dunnington, 2003 Everyman

Chess, Figurine Algebraic Notation, Softcover, 144pp.,
$19.95

Chess Psychology by Angus Dunnington

is an introduction to those elusive
aspects of competition that often mean
the difference between victory and
defeat. It is a short book, but contains a
lot of practical advice tinged with the
costly wisdom that Mr. Dunnington has
acquired during his own career as a
player.

The book is divided into three sections. The first is a

catalogue of various aspects of chess psychology such as
gamesmanship, sleep, physical fitness, inner piece and the
like. Section two, which is the largest section in the book,
gives a number of practical examples which illustrate
various themes such as over-confidence, traps, being
surprised, winning a won game etc. Section three contains a
selection of illustrative games.

As stated above, section one is a brief survey of various

general psychological factors that can affect our play. Most
of it we have heard before. Certainly we all know that we
should get enough sleep, and try to be calm during the game
(easier said than done) and get proper exercise blah, blah,
blah …What saves this section from being a bore is Mr.
Dunnington’s lively writing style, and the use of concrete
examples, many drawn from his own experience, to
illustrate his points.

This is not to say that there is nothing to be learned in this section. The
author’s discussion of memory, for instance, I found very instructive. He
starts with a little irony, by quoting Einstein on memory: “Personally, I never

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clutter up my memory with facts I can easily find in an encyclopedia.” Tell

that to any ambitious chess player! Of course, then Mr. Dunnington gets
down to the serious business of advising us players on how to cram as many
facts as possible into our poor overloaded brains.

And he dispenses a lot of good advice. For instance:

If we are to benefit from experience and learning

in chess we need to make maximum use of our
memory, and this means using a process known
as “elaborate rehearsal”. This occurs when the
material is considered and organized in some
sort of ordered fashion. By engineering a logical
framework from the information in front of us
we are then able to store ideas, themes,
techniques, theoretical developments and so on
in a way that facilitates our recalling them when
the appropriate time comes. This why trying to
remember only the actual moves of variations in
openings and defenses rather that the reasoning
behind them and their various positional,
structural, tactical and general thematic
implications is simply not good enough.

He also introduces a concept he calls “overlearning”, which

I think can be very helpful to anyone trying to master the
opening.

If we have the time, by studying and rehearsing

past the point of initial mastery, we can further
improve our recall – this process is called
overlearning. Every now and then we should
review material, whether this is opening theory,
endgame technique, various middlegame
strategies etc. In this way we reach an optimum
level of overlearning.

Another interesting tidbit I gleaned from his discussion is that increasing the
amount of glucose in one’s system can aid recall. Does this mean we should
put more sugar in our coffee? Well we may remember everything, but then
again we may be too hyper to put it to any good use! Oh well, you can’t have
everything.

Section two begins with a discussion of the psychological factors involved in

exploiting an advantage. Specifically, the author studies the problem of when
to cash in a superior position, and win material. Often there is an irresistible
urge to win material, especially when playing a stronger player. Lack of
confidence, and other emotional factors, can cloud our judgment. What if we
have overestimated our position? Perhaps our position plusses are only

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illusory?

The author gives a position from the game Vallejo Pons – Sokolov,
Mondariz 2001, which is instructive in this regard.

Thus far the young Vallejo-Pons has

played an excellent game against his
older, and more experienced opponent.
White has a real bind on the position, and
Black is suffering from an acute shortage
of space. White should continue to
maintain the pressure by 34.h5! fixing
Black’s pawns and gaining space on the
kingside. A possible continuation would
be 34…Bf8 35.Qxd7 Rxd7 36.Nb6 Rd2
37.Rc8 f6 38.Kf3 fxe5 39.Ke3 Rd6
40.Nc4 Rd5 41.Ke4 and White has a
clear advantage. Instead White decided to win material with the immediate
34.Qxd7 Rxd7 35.Nxe7+ Rxe7 36.Rc8+?! Kh7 37.Ra8 b3! 38.Rxa5 bxa2
39.Rxa2 Rb7 and despite his extra pawn he was unable to win the endgame.

This is a good illustration of the dangers inherent in the supposedly safe

route of winning material. White probably overlooked or miscalculated the
effects of 37…b3. The clear win of a pawn turned out to have even more
uncertainty attached to it than maintaining the pressure.

Another, related example, is from Kudrin – Tal, Titograd, 1984:

Here Dunnington is discussing the

psychological aspects of setting traps for
your opponents when your position is
worse. The idea is to capitalize on the
tendency of players to want to “cash in”
on their positional superiority. In the
above position Tal is much worse, but he
played the inspired. 19…Qf5! White was
threatening 20.f4, winning the Knight, so
this move looks like it is providing an
escape square for the Knight, but it also
has another idea. Kudrin saw that he
could now win a pawn and played 20.Bxa7?! and the game continued
20…Rxa7! 21.Qb6 Nf3+ 22.Kh1 Rc4 23.Qxa7 Rh4!! 24.gxh4 Qf4 25.Kg2
Nxh4+ 26.Kg1 Nf3+ 27.Kg2 Nh4+ with a perpetual check.

When I saw this position I wondered how GM Kudrin could go pawn

grabbing against Tal, of all people. But then I remembered that when Tal
was at his peak, grandmaster wisdom in the Soviet Union was “If Petrosian
sacrifices a piece, you might as well resign, but if Tal sacrifices a piece, take
it, the sacrifice may be unsound!” Perhaps this thought occurred to Kudrin.
There is always a way to convince yourself that what you want to do is also
the correct way to proceed.

I must say that seeing example after example of strong players falling into
traps, and making assorted psychological blunders gave me a satisfying
sense of what the Germans call schadenfreude, the guilty pleasure of seeing
other people’s suffering. It is nice to see that the Grandmasters suffer from
the same human frailties as the rest of us.

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Another interesting topic discussed in this section is “inducing mistakes in

simple positions.” Consider this position: Z. Varga - Bakre Budapest 2001:

White played 15.Rd3 and Black

responded 15…Rfe8. As Dunnington
points out, this is a somewhat
questionable decision, given White’s
obvious intention of doubling on the d-
file. White no played the cunning (from
the psychological perspective) 16.Bf4!
and was immediately rewarded for his
psychological perspicacity as Black
replied 16…e5?! Black should have
played 16…Red8 and admitted his
mistake. It is, of course, difficult to do
this because you are showing weakness to your opponent. Also, it may give
the impression that you do not know what you are doing. Black’s reluctance
to admit is mistake has resulted in the weakening of d5, and has given White
a weakness to focus on. The game continued 17.Be3 Bd7 18.g4 Be6 19.g5
Nd7 20. Nd5 Bd8 21.h4 Nc5 22.Bxc5 dxc5 23.Ne3 Bxb3 24.axb3 and
White had a clear advantage.

The final section of the book contains several illustrative games. It has a
redundant feel similar to the introductory sections of Excelling at Positional
Chess. However, the last illustrative game ends the book on an ominous
note. It shows Fritz SSS dismantling Dutch GM Erik Van Den Doel. No
amount of psychology could help him in that game.

I highly recommend this book to anyone looking for an introduction to the

psychological aspects of chess playing. It is not only entertaining, but it also
gives you the weapons and confidence that will enable you to keep fighting
when things are not going your way.

Order Chess Psychology

by Angus Dunnington

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