C.J.S. Purdy was an International Master, the former Australian Champion and first World Correspondence Chess Champion. Purdy was editor of the magazine Australasian Chess Review (1929-1944), Check (1944-1945), and Chess World (1946-1967). He was a fabulous chess teacher/writer. Bobby Fischer highly respected Purdy.

"Follow Reti's Advice: When trying to win, destroy opponent's strengths; when trying to equalize, go for his weaknesses. It doesn't always help, but is worth bearing in mind."

-- Cecil Purdy

* 1952 Match: Game Collection: Sarapu - Purdy Match, Australasian Championship * Co-Champions: Sarapu - Purdy Australasian Championship (1952)

* Action Chess 24 Hours repertoire: Game Collection: Action Chess :Purdy's 24 hour opening repertoire

* Your only task in the opening is to reach a playable middlegame. - Lajos Portisch.

* https://purdychess.blogspot.com/

* Mato video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=myn...

C. J. S. Purdy (1906–1979)
Includes the names: C. J. S Purdy, C. J. S. Purdy, Cecil John Seddon Purdy

Guide to Good Chess
The Search for Chess Perfection (Purdy Series)
Purdy on the Endgame (C.J.S. Purdy Gold Chess Series) EXTREME CHESS World Championships 1935 1937 1972 Action Chess: Purdy's 24 Hours Opening Repertoire Chess Made Easy
How Fischer won: world chess championship, 1972
How Purdy Won: 1st World Champion of Correspondence Chess (Purdy Series) Chess Bits and Obits
How Purdy Won: The correspondence chess career of a world champion C.J.S. Purdy: his life, his games and his writings. Edited by John Hammond… C.J.S. Purdy's Fine Art of Chess Annotation and Other Thoughts, Vol.… Inside Look at What's Wrong with Your Chess?
How Euwe Won: Book of the World's Championship Chess Match… Among these mates, chirpings of a chess chump

Blogger:
PS I strongly recommend two books by C. J. S. Purdy, the first World Correspondece Champion and editor of the legendary Chess World. 1) Guide to Good Chess
2) The Search for Chess Perfection
Both published by Thinker's Press.
I have been a master for over twenty years if memory serves and I still learn something nearly everytime I open SCP. It is the best instructional book I have ever read by a very large margin. Just a sweaty old fat guy's opinion.

Friday, September 23, 2022
An Instructional Tactical Game

In his writings that exceptional teacher C.J.S. Purdy reminded readers to always comb the board for tactics after your opponent moves. And, before making your own move you should visualize the new position for tactics. If you don't ask yourself if your opponent has any threats, you will constantly be making blunders. Likewise, if you don't look for tactical threat before you move, you will constantly miss them. There's no point in strategic planning when there's a winning combination in the position. As Teichmann once put it, chess is 99 per cent tactics, but after playing on some servers I have come to the conclusion that a lot of amateur players have no idea what tactics are. They seem to think that just willy-nilly sacrificing a piece or making a bad move for the sake of a vague "threat" is playing tactically. They play like the guy I played several games against online the other day. He insisted on plying 1.e5 and 2.Qh5; sure Nakamura has played it in Blitz, but he's a Super-GM. My opponent also liked to play Bf4 and Bxf7+ or Nf3, Ng5 and Nxf7. We had a little conversation between moves and when I asked him about it, his comment was that he wins a lot of games by playing tactically. He wasn't playing tactically, he was blundering. Another opponent who was badgering me and using a lot of profanity stated he was an "opening innovator." When I replied that there is a difference between an opening innovation and a bad move, it elicited a string of cuss words. I took great pleasure in gloating over beating him a couple of times. The point is that there is a difference between playing tactically and giving away a piece for nothing. Purdy always emphasized sound tactics. I am discounting Tal-like, risky, unclear sacrifices because most of us are not as good as he was and can't calculate like he did. The way you find tactics is not looking at the position and trying various moves until you find something that works. If you see one or more of these things, there is a possibility that a tactical solution exists:

1. Look at all checks.
2. Look for undefended pieces.
3. Look for pins and forks.
4. Look for pieces (especially the King!) that do not have any escape squares. 5. Look for masked pieces (i.e. pieces on the same line) 6. Look for pieces that may be performing more than one defensive task 7. Finally, briefly look at bizarre and surprising moves, sacrifices, Pawn breaks and "obviously unplayable" moves.

More often than not, there won't be a sound tactic available, but only after you have ascertained that there isn't should you proceed with your strategical plan, assuming you have one...a lot of amateurs don't. Back in my day positional play was emphasized and tactics were a neglected area. Today it's the other way around, or at least it seems that way. During a game, especially in complicated, unclear positions, you have to be extremely attentive otherwise unpleasant surprises will await you. No matter how good a strategical plan might be, a tactical mistake will completely ruin it. That's a problem with chess...it may take 40 moves to win, but only one bad one to lose.

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