Customer Reviews

The Art of the King's Indian

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Eduard Gufeld's The Art of the King's Indian stands out as a chess book that is well worth owning, especially if you are interested in the King's Indian Defense. The book is written with an admitted black bias, but players of the white side can certainly gleam valuable knowledge as well.
The late GM has/had a reputation as a chess writer that was somewhat less than desirable due to his quick turnout of rehashed material and a rather blasé way of annotating games. He was known for his salesmanship and self-promotion, but he was a genuine lover of chess. His love of chess and his particular love of the fianchetto systems of the Sicilian Dragon and the King's Indian Defense is what makes this book so special.
Gufeld remained loyal to the King's Indian his entire chess career, and this book is atrue labor of love. While it is true that as an older GM well past any championship aspirations, Gufeld had a tendency to play older systems in the KID, there is still great value in playing over the games of KID specialists like Gufeld. Yes, this book contains mostly Gufeld's own games, but there are several other games from Fischer, Kasparov, Shirov, Smirin and others.
What makes this book so different from the other Gufeld openings books are the annotations and stories, which are plentiful, that give the reader such a savory delight in replaying the games. Gufeld explains the strategies and tactics involved thoroughly in words, not just annotations. He covers all of the main variations; the Samisch, the Classical, the Four Pawns Attack, the Fianchetto systems and the Bg5 systems (which includes the Averbakh, but avoids the Torre and notably the Trompovsky, which Gufeld hated.
Gufeld seems to have never stayed into the so-called modern ways of handling the KID by allowing his knights to develop on the rim with say, Na6. With that in mind, if you are looking for a thorough treatise on the KID or are trying to develop a repertoire, The Art of the King's Indian may not be what you are looking for. However if you are looking to further your understanding of the King's Indian, or are not opposed to using the older more classical ways of handling the opening, this is a great book. Any club level, weekend tournament type player will be able to better understand this dynamic opening by reading this book and playing the games. In this regard it is similar to Bronstein on the King's Indian. If you are looking to begin a repertoire on the KID, I would recommend starting with GM Joe Gallagher's Starting Out: the King's Indian, add this book and/or Bronstein's, either Levy and O'Connell's How to Play the King's Indian, or Bellin and Ponzetto's Mastering the King's Indian., Then pursue the more involved books by Nunn, Gallagher, and company on the various variations and suggested repertoires.
Like many people, I have been sucked into buying several on Gufeld's and for that matter Schiller's weak efforts. This book is not one of those. I highly recommend it to club level KID players.