PANDOLFINI’S ULTIMATE GUIDE TO CHESS by BRUCE PANDOLFINI

Author:BRUCE PANDOLFINI
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Published: 2003-10-15T00:00:00+00:00

Diagram 205. Black’s bishop pair is strong.

Student: Could you offer anything more about the qualities of knights?

Teacher: There is something nice about knights. By being able to guard both light and dark squares, the knight is suited for both offensive and defensive action. For example, it can attack squares of one color while occupying the other color, enabling it to confront an opposing bishop without the bishop being able to attack the knight. Moreover, by attacking and guarding squares a friendly bishop can’t cover, a knight is able to help a player influence squares of both colors. The two pieces can work in beautiful harmony. Style is another factor. Some players have a bent for manipulating the bishop-and-knight combination, but this works only when the position permits such flexibility. Then there’s sheer obduracy. Some players prefer particular circumstances, without regard to truth or merit, simply because they just do. Seek out such people and use their own thinking, or lack of it, against them.

Student: If bishops are generally superior to knights, why are a queen and a knight working together preferred to a queen and a bishop?

Teacher: You’ve obviously been chatting with some strong players, many of whom don’t even know how to tell a joke. In either case, whether you have a queen and a bishop or a queen and a knight, the real power is the queen and the various attacking motifs at its disposal. The bishop is an imperfect partner for the queen because at most it can guard just half the squares on the board, and only squares of one color at that. It can’t protect a queen occupying a square of the other color. Moreover, the bishop merely duplicates the queen’s diagonal move. Admittedly, that can be useful, of course, and most particularly when it’s needed.

Student: I get it. A knight, on the other hand, is capable of attacking all of the board’s squares and can offer the queen twice as many support points as the bishop. The knight moves in a way the queen can’t, and that’s sure to add a vital extra dimension to the assault. If the knight can get near the target, it must be an excellent attack-mate for the queen, both as a supporter and because of its unique weaponry.

Teacher: Once again we see how circumstances can change everything. A bishop is generally slightly better than a knight, but in the above discussion the knight gets the edge over the bishop. What a world this chess is. It doesn’t allow us to fall back on mindless platitudes or feckless placebos, and it punishes us for failing to look at what’s actually happening. How fair is that?

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