José Raúl Capablanca
Chess Fundamentals
The world champion's own course in the essentials: simple mates, pawn endings, the opening, the middle-game and the end-game, with every example playable on the board and checked by a modern engine.
Chess Fundamentals was first published thirteen years ago. Since then there have appeared at different times a number of articles dealing with the so-called Hypermodern Theory. Those who have read the articles may well have thought that something new, of vital importance, had been discovered. The fact is that the Hypermodern Theory is merely the application, during the opening stages generally, of the same old principles through the medium of somewhat new tactics. There has been no change in the fundamentals. The change has been only a change of form, and not always for the best at that.
In chess the tactics may change but the strategic fundamental principles are always the same, so that Chess Fundamentals is as good now as it was thirteen years ago. It will be as good a hundred years from now; as long in fact as the laws and rules of the game remain what they are at present. The reader may therefore go over the contents of the book with the assurance that there is in it everything he needs, and that there is nothing to be added and nothing to be changed. Chess Fundamentals was the one standard work of its kind thirteen years ago and the author firmly believes that it is the one standard work of its kind now.
J. R. CAPABLANCA, New York, Sept. 1, 1934
Chapters
- 1First Principles: Endings, Middle-Game and OpeningsThe simple mates, how a single pawn is won or drawn, pawn endings, winning combinations in the middle-game, the value of the pieces, and the principles of the opening.
- 2Further Principles in End-Game PlayA unit that holds two, a classical King and Pawn ending, passed Pawns and counting, the opposition, Knight against Bishop, the mate with Knight and Bishop, and Queen against Rook.
- 3Planning a Win in Middle-Game PlaySeven winning positions from Capablanca's own games: attacks without Knights, attacks led by Knights, and winning a Pawn by indirect attack.
- 4General TheoryThe initiative, direct attacks en masse, the force of the threatened attack, giving up the initiative for material, and cutting pieces off from the action, shown in four complete games.
- 5End-Game StrategyRook endings from master play: the sudden attack from a different side, the danger of a safe position, Rook and Pawn endings worked out in depth, two Rooks against two Rooks, and Rook and Bishop against Rook and Knight.
How this book was checked
This edition follows the text of the Project Gutenberg edition of Chess Fundamentals (eBook #33870), the revised edition of 1934, which is in the public domain in the United States. The only change to Capablanca's words is the notation: his descriptive notation ("R - R 7") is given in modern algebraic notation ("Ra7"). Every move in the examples was converted by replaying it on a board and matching it to the one legal move it can be, and every position starts from the book's own diagrams. Evaluations under the boards are from Stockfish 18. Where the engine disagrees with the text, a short editor's note says so; Capablanca's text is left as he wrote it.