Classic Backgammon Revisited, Second Edition [Paperback]

Jeremy Paul Bagai (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 12, 2005

120 previously published problems . . . reanalyzed. The biggest errors from the best authors. Collected and corrected.

Editorial Reviews

Review

I believe it to be an essential purchase for anyone serious about developing their understanding of the game. --Chris Bray, What Color Is The Wind?

About the Author

Jeremy Paul Bagai has published backgammon articles in Anchors: The New England Backgammon Review, Chicago Point, Flint Area Backgammon News, and Inside Backgammon. His annotated match with Kit Woolsey was one of the very first instructional works on backgammon to be available on the Internet. This is his first book. He is the owner and editor of The Fortuitous Press, publisher of Backgammon Boot Camp by Walter Trice, and Backgammon Praxis by Marty Storer. Jeremy received his B.A. in Psychology from the University of California at Berkeley, and his Ph.D. in the psychology of human decision-making from the University of Pennsylvania. He lectured at the Wharton School for a time in order to pay off his gambling debts, and when that proved insufficient to the task, he briefly traded options for Wolfram and Hart. He feels fortunate to be living in the San Francisco Bay Area, and wishes he played backgammon better than he does.

Product Details

• Paperback: 208 pages
• Publisher: Fortuitous Press (December 12, 2005)
• ISBN-10: 0943292379
• ISBN-13: 978-0943292373
• Product Dimensions: 9.9 x 6.9 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,485,517 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Will definitely help your game..., April 11, 2006

By 

backgammoner (new york, ny) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Classic Backgammon Revisited, Second Edition (Paperback)

I have 3 gripes with this book in spite of the overall excellent content.

(1) It's a lot easier to reverse engineer the right analysis when you've got the Snowie rollouts in front of you. The difficult thing is to come up with consistently the correct analysis without a computer, which is what the authors that Bagai examines had to do. In my opinion he does not acknowlege that fact enough, and he uses mildy ad-hominem language to describe the pre-computer analyses of some of the most innovative thinkers the game ever had ("Amusingly, Robertie hallucinates a double-pass here..."). The tone is a bit condescending, which I think is odd, especially in contrast to point #2, below.

(2) There are some very weird tributes to Danny Kleinman (the author of the self-published Vision Laughs at Counting, among many others). For example: "Kleinman was the first to analyze these kinds of match cubes, naming them 'gammicidal.' But then, Kleinman was the first to analyze everything." Really. But possibly the greatest and most influential book on Backgammon ever written by Magriel was published before Kleinman's books. Perhaps Magriel didn't analyze anything? Absurd. Why Bagai is so fawning over Kleinman is perplexing. And his explanations of why he excuses Kleinman from the laser focus of his Snowie rollouts is unconvincing, especially given his constant reference to him.

(3) Bagai often includes secondary or tertiary positions to further drive home the point he's making. But in several places he isn't particulary clear about the correct play in the back-up diagrams! Frustrating. And yes, you can mostly figure out what the correct play is, but why not just come out and say it? Backgammon is hard enough without having to parse out what the author is implying is correct.

And as a tiny, tiny, final issue, I wish he had numbered the diagrams on the left hand pages by the edge of the page instead of by the binding. The way it is now is a bit awkward if you are flipping to an even-numbered position.

All of that being said, THIS BOOK IS GREAT. The gripes I've mentioned are stylistic. But the main issue for a book of this kind (it isn't a novel, after all) is *content* and the content is fantastic. It will improve your game. It will clean away all the nagging questions you've had as you read Magriel , Robertie, and the others as to what's correct.

7 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Bring your game into the 21st century!, February 15, 2006

By 

David - See all my reviews

This review is from: Classic Backgammon Revisited, Second Edition (Paperback)

I played a lot of backgammon in the boom of the 1980's and read all of the best literature at the time -- Paul Magriel, Barclay Cooke, etc. I started playing again in the past few years and found that the game had changed. A lot.

Sophisticated computer programs ("bots") such as Jellyfish, Snowie and gnubg have changed how top players think about backgammon.

Classic Backgammon Revisted explains which concepts have survived the "bot" revolution -- and more importantly, which have not. This was the first new backgammon book I bought since returning to backgammon. It has repaid me many times over.

Your opponents have read this book. You can't afford to be without it!

5 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars morally disgusting, July 29, 2009

By 

Farley "sutton-brown" (Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Classic Backgammon Revisited, Second Edition (Paperback)

Hi folks. My name is Jerem... eh.. John Doe. I'm a lousy backgammon
player and a lousier writer. I have absolutely NOTHING to contribute
to the backgammon community, but I'm vain and I want to be known in
the community. So I decided to "write" a book slashing at the great players of the past, you know, those guys that played backgammon using only their grey matter(I wonder where I can buy that) without any help from bots, which didn't even exist then. Of course, as I told you, I'm mediocre but I'm a Snowie lackey, so I'll put down everything my master tells me to. So buy my book, ok? Go ahead, make my day!