Has anyone here really studied Larsen's games or read much about him? I know virtually nothing about him, other than hearing tidbits about how strong he was, and that he had somewhat of an original, unorthodox playing style. I'd be curious to hear what y'all think.

What sparked this thread is a new Larsen book is being released in early September and I thought it might be interesting to pick up a copy.

Link to the book

lol...I thought Gus Hansen was the original Great Dane!

I haven't but really should study his legacy, as he was the king of openings, in particular, the Accelerated Dragon.

Speaking of, OP, have you ever tried the Sniper (Pterodactyl) System (g6, Bg7 and c5 before anything else, with the idea of meeting dxc5 by Qa5)? I guess, as a Modern Defense player, you must have studied it. It seems to work against almost all natural White setups (e4, d4, c4, Nf3, Nc3 in any order), except 1. d4 g6 2. c4 Bg7 3. Nc3 (the refutation of 3... c5 there has already been mentioned on 2+2), but in this case we can do well with the great and terrible Gurdenidze (3... c6).

Google's first page shows 4 Pterodactyl games of Larsen: vs Lutikov, Donner, Gheorghiu, Mazzoni.

(I assume you already know the 1970 USSR vs USA match game that Larsen lost to Spassky with the white pieces, it's classic.)

I recently saw a book on the Sniper, but I can't remember the exact title. To answer your question, I've never specifically studied the line you gave above, but I have incorporated the c5/Qa5 idea into some of the Modern games. I like playing it because it gets me into new positions and my opponents don't seem to be too particularly booked up on it either.

How have your results been with it?

1 upsetting loss so far because of FPS at move 7, lolfail. I need to get used to players making non-database moves in situations unknown to them than I create. I assumed that the reason why White's 7th move has never been played at the master level is that it's a blunder... well, it wasn't; it was quite a normal knight exchange, but I started looking for a refuting zwischenzug instead (didn't see how bad Qd4 was for me, i.e. that the queen exchange would also get the knight out of danger).

I've recalled the Sniper's existence only recently while trying to refresh the repertoire against 1. d4, need to build a sample yet.

I haven't verified the soundness of 9.-Qc1+, but it looks mandatory in light of the alternatives. The idea is 10. Ke2 dxc6 11. Qxh8 Bg4+, followed later by queenside castling and an "attack".

Oh dear, you're right (I've engine-checked) - Qc1+ (with 12... Qc2+ prior to castling) is the salvation, and it's better for White to not take the rook as otherwise he'll have to give up at least the other knight and the queen (for the other rook) to prevent mate.

The problem is that I'm worse than you and Larsen, plus I have a terrible mental game even in chess.

Edit: it's not a full excuse for me, as I had seen a similar sac (but of the a8 rook) in GM Ron Henley's Youtube video on the Pterodactyl the day before (the analysis of that game starts at this timestamp).

The Qxh8 line is bananas.

Speaking of engine checks, it looks as if 8. c5 is the zwischenzug's proper refutation (a counter-zwischenzug!), winning material without hazarding Pandora's Rookbox. The hardest "simple tactics" to spot usually involve pawn moves, I've noticed.

Back to the main topic, this is amazing:

In 1967/1968 Larsen won five international elite events in a row, a truly spectacular achievement. His successes were such that Bobby Fischer let him play first board in the legendary match Soviet Union vs. the World in 1970 in Belgrade.

Hmm. The USSR team was absolutely stacked.

Haha, holy crap. When Keres is your board 10, your team is fairly strong.

Wow, what a counterzwischenzug! Now we've got the idea about how wild an opening the Sniper is

I didn't know that Stein was so strong, had heard of him only in relation to his Sousse'67 game with Fischer. Tal's placement on the 9th board is the most amazing to me, followed by Bronstein's exile in the reserve.

Before reading beyond the first post about this game, I noticed the Qc1 line, and some of the Qxh8 craziness, but not c5. Fun stuff.

On topic, the first Larsen game that I ever saw was an infamous 17-move loss to Spassky. http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1128831

I first saw this on a Bruce Pandolfini tape when I was a child. I thought Larsen must really not have been that good at all, by the way he played such a weird opening and lost so quickly. I had a lot to learn about chess, and history, and its perceptions.

Years ago I studied his games as I was copying some of his unorthodox openings. It was certainly entertaining to do so. Thanks for the heads up about the book.

One of my first chess books was the Piatagorski Cup 1974. It made a big deal of Larsen revitalizing old lines with new moves. That's when I became a fan and tried to copy his style. I started playing inferior lines and unsound sacrifices and gambits. As Fischer went out of favor Larsen became the anti-soviet hope. I actually think of Nakamura as a similar player.

This thread reminded me of the wonderful Agony columns by Mike Wilder, http://www.borderschess.org/Agony1.htm. The last one is about his game vs. Larsen.

That column is really hilarious. This part made me lol at my desk at work, particularly the Eric Schiller mention.

There is already a games collection available "Larsen's Selected Games of Chess 1948-69". The book stands out as Larsen is very honest in his annotations and really gets into the psychology of why he plays certain moves -- there isn't another book like it. It is actually very humorous. I only hope is writing style hasn't changed too much in the new book!

Petrosian nicely sums up Larsen's style: "I am one of those players who always regarded Larsen's manner of play with a certain scepticism. But when I now look at how he plays!... Of course he is not a player of such a solid style as many of the leading Soviet grandmasters, but he can win against anyone and lose to anyone. He is a player who, in view of his character and creative views, will find it hard to reach a match for the world championship, but his boldness and his concrete and non-routine approach to positions cannot fail to appeal to all connoisseurs of chess."

Kasparov and Botvinnik were not fans of Larsen's ambitious play. If I remember correctly, they believed the greatest insult you could level against a GM was to say he played like Larsen.

I had a look at the table of contents for Larsen's new book and the first 181 pages or so are an exact copy of "Larsen's Selected Games of Chess 1948-69". I suppose the only difference is it's now algebraic notation instead of descriptive notation.

I guess this shouldn't be surprising. After annotating games from decades ago, most GMs do not go back and give fresh annotations, although there are exceptions. Botvinnik put together new notes for most of his games sometime in the '80s. Kasparov's recent games collection was updated with brand new notes when compared to the "Test for Time".

I think the trend is when releasing newer books is to gloss over the period for which a previous games collection has already covered. Karpov has many best games collections, but his recent "My Best Games", Edition Olms, 2007, included very few games from the period previously covered by "My Best Games", RHM 1978 and "Chess at the Top", Pergamon, 1984.

Unfortunately what also happens is the publisher will re-release a book and tack on a few extra games and try to sucker us into buying it. Yes Vishy, I am thinking of you...

You certainly can't blame Larsen for New In Chess re-releasing in paperback what used to exist in a gorgeous Bell(!) hardcover, as Larsen is no longer with us. One has to think that perhaps the only reason this is being re-released is because "Larsen is no longer with us" and is unable to put a stop to it. It's true that Hadringe Simpole re-released the Bell book in paperback in 2003, but the consumer knew exactly what he was buying.

On Amazon the new Larsen book is only $26 and I'll certainly get it for the 2nd half of the book, but it's off-putting that nowhere in the promotional material do they mention that half of the book was already published 45 years ago. AND THAT'S WHAT GRINDS MY GEARS. /end rant