International Master Tibor Karolyi and FIDE Master Tigran Gyozalyan have written a comprehensive two-volume treatise on the life and games of Tigran Petrosian, who was world champion from 1963-1969. The present Volume II takes the reader on a journey from Tigran's victory in the 1963 world title match against Mikhail Botvinnik, when he firmly established himself as the best player in the world, through his next two title matches against Boris Spassky in 1966 and 1969 and subsequent candidates matches against Bobby Fischer, Victor Korchnoi and other world-class players of the era. It covers all his tournaments and matches of the second half of his career, ending with his final games in 1983. Karolyi and Gyozalyan provide deep modern analysis of 175 full games and fragments, and summarise almost all known games played by Petrosian in the period. They also provide considerable background colour on each game, with round-by-round analysis of tournaments and matches in which they were played. Many of these games have not previously been analysed in detail in modern books, and those that were have nevertheless been subjected to considerably improved analysis. Petrosian's opponents in Volume II include world champions and challengers Kasparov, Karpov, Fischer, Spassky, Tal, Smyslov, Botvinnik, Korchnoi, and Bronstein, as well as leading players such as Timman, Larsen, Reshevsky, Beliavsky, Polugaevsky, Portisch, Romanishin, and many others. There is a special focus on his coaches Suetin and Zaitsev. An added bonus is the inclusion of rare photos taken from private collections in Georgia and Armenia, many of which have never before been published in the West.

Tigran Petrosian is a titan of chess history. All agree he was a genius of strategy, defense and sacrifice, but didn t he take too many draws? Possibly so, but when Petrosian selected and annotated his best games, that flaw disappeared, leaving only brilliance and profound chess understanding. As Garry Kasparov said: "My games with the 9th World Champion broadened my understanding of chess. Had it not been for these two defeats, I would possibly not have reached the top in chess." This book is an English translation of a Russian classic that is a favorite of many grandmasters, including Mihail Marin and Levon Aronian. A literal translation of the Russian title might be 'The Strategy of Soundness' but Python Strategy is a better fit for Petrosian s more ambitious games. As another World Champion, Max Euwe, once wrote: "Petrosian is not a tiger that pounces on its prey, but rather a python that smothers its victim."

Tigran Petrosian (1929-1984) was World Chess Champion from 1963 to 1969 and was one of the strongest players in the world throughout his lengthy career. Petrosian was a Candidate for the World Championship on eight occasions (1953, 1956, 1959, 1962, 1971, 1974, 1977 and 1980). He won the world championship in 1963 by defeating Botvinnik, successfully defended it in 1966 against Spassky, and lost it in 1969 to Spassky. Thus, he was the defending World Champion or a World Champion Candidate in ten consecutive three-year cycles. This book was originally published in Descriptive Chess Notation. Since that time, Descriptive has become almost obsolete. For that reason, all 50 games in this book have been converted into modern Algebraic Notation and are included in an appendix in the back of the book.

This book describes the intense rivalry--and collaboration--of the four players who created the golden era when USSR chess players dominated the world. More than 200 annotated games are included, along with personal details--many for the first time in English. Mikhail Tal, the roguish, doomed Latvian who changed the way chess players think about attack and sacrifice; Tigran Petrosian, the brilliant, henpecked Armenian whose wife drove him to become the world's best player; Boris Spassky, the prodigy who survived near-starvation and later bouts of melancholia to succeed Petrosian--but is best remembered for losing to Bobby Fischer; and "Evil" Viktor Korchnoi, whose mixture of genius and jealousy helped him eventually surpass his three rivals (but fate denied him the title they achieved: world champion).

Welcome to Tiger’s Den! Tigran Petrosian, the ninth world chess champion, was one of the deepest thinkers the chess world has ever seen. His handling of complex strategic positions was legendary. Now, for the first time, Russian international master Igor Yanvarjov has put together a superb collection of virtually all the known games played by Petrosian – with both colors – in the King’s Indian Defense and other closely related Indian structures. The author’s objective was, first of all, to reveal the richness of Petrosian’s chess world and to follow the strategic development of the King’s Indian Defense through the prism of Petrosian’s creative work. He does this with the presentation of almost 300 deeply annotated, complete games. Contents include: Preface by Levon Aronian; Foreword by Igor Zaitsev; The Classical Variation; The Sämisch System ; The Fianchetto Variation; The Benoni; Other Systems; Portrait of a Chess Player; Lessons from Petrosian; The Problem of the Exchange; “Furman’s Bishop”; “Pawns are the soul of chess”; Playing by Analogy; Maneuvering Battle; Experiments; Realist or Romantic?; The King’s Indian with Colors – and Flanks – Reversed; Appendix; Index of Tabiyas; ECO/Opening/Tabiya Indexes. This splendid collection of annotated games will not only have enormous appeal to King’s Indian aficionados, but to all chessplayers who wish to expand their understanding of the strategic concepts underpinning the royal game as a whole.

This large and magnificent work of art is both an interpretive history of Soviet chess from the Bolshevik Revolution to the collapse of the U.S.S.R. in 1991 and a record of the most interesting games played. The text traces the phenomenal growth of chess from the Revolutionary days to the devastations of World War II, and then from the Golden Age of Soviet-dominated chess in the 1950s to the challenge of Bobby Fischer and the quest to find his Soviet match. Included are 249 games, each with a diagram; most are annotated and many have never before been published outside the Soviet Union. The text is augmented by photographs and includes 63 tournament and match scoretables. Also included are a bibliography, an appendix of records achieved in Soviet national championships, two indexes of openings, and an index of players and opponents.