Yakov Vilner. First Ukrainian Chess Champion and First USSR Chess Composition Champion.

 

Book Review by Carl Portman

YAKOV VILNER

FIRST UKRAINIAN CHESS CHAMPION AND FIRST USSR CHESS COMPOSITION CHAMPION

by SERGEI TKACHENKO

 

Sergei Tkachenko

Pages: 386

Published by: Elk and Ruby Publishing House   

2021 Softcover

 

From the Publisher

Yakov Vilner (1899-1931) was one of the leading Soviet chess masters in the 1920s. He won the Ukrainian championship three times (1924, 1925 and 1928), the Odessa championship five times (1918, 1923, 1925, 1926 and 1928) and competed in five USSR championships, his highest position being sixth equal in 1924. His attacking, combinational style delivered many memorable games and he regularly played against strong contemporaries such as Bogoljubov, Romanovsky, Bogatyrchuk, Verlinsky and an upcoming teenager called Botvinnik.

Vilner was also a leading chess composer. He won the USSR composition championship for three-move problems in 1929 and in total he won prizes at 30 chess composition competitions.

In this historical work illustrated with rare archival photos from the period, Sergei Tkachenko tells the story of a man who, despite suffering constantly from the respiratory illness that would eventually end his life at the age of just 31, was a leading chess organizer and journalist in Ukraine as well as a player and composer, against a background of major social and political upheaval that significantly impacted the chess world. It was Vilner who, in 1919 as a member of the Revolutionary Tribunal in Odessa, managed to save Alexander Alekhine from the firing squad, which Tkachenko wrote about in his book Alekhine's Odessa Secrets: Chess, War and Revolution. The latter work was short-listed for the 2018 English Chess Federation Book of the Year.

 

Tkachenko has selected 49 full games and another six fragments, annotated in detail by Vilner himself, Tkachenko, Romanovsky, Bogatyrchuk, and other leading players of the 1920s. The author has also included all 95 of Vilner’s known problems and studies, some of which are fairy problems, as well as many earlier versions and related compositions. Like in Tkachenko’s other collections, all 95 compositions are set on the right-hand side of the page with the solution overleaf.

This book will be of great interest to fans of Soviet chess history, exciting games collections and problem solving.

 

Contents

 

·         Part I – Life and Games (Thirteen sections)

·         Part II – Compositions and related works (Three sections)

·         Index of games and fragments (including openings)

·         Vilner’s key achievements

 

My thoughts and comments

First of all, and just one reason why these books from Elk and Ruby are so important, is that they bring to our attention characters from the past who might otherwise have passed us by. Yakov Vilner does not appear even in the Oxford Companion to Chess (Hooper and Whyld) which is a crying shame. Was nothing known of him at the time? Well anyway here he is, ‘Herz und Seele’ within a single book of dedication. I feel rather humbled to be one of the beneficiaries of such hard work. I admit to having a great interest in Russian/Soviet chess throughout history, so I was looking forward with great anticipation to opening the pages.

 

Here we have a man who like so many before him made significant contributions to chess and who died very young. He passed away at the criminally young age of thirty-one. They say it is not the years that you put in your life, but the life that you put in your years. Well, Yakov Vilner certainly packed a lot in, despite his poor health both with over the board play and chess compositions. The book is written in two parts, the first being an overview of his life and games, and the second containing those compositions and related works.

 

How did the book make me feel?

We tend to think about chess in a contemporary way, forgetting those who have gone before. We live and breathe in the time we are born, for sure. Today we have advanced medicines to keep us alive, especially for respiratory illness, but there was nothing like this for Vilner. Today we can enjoy excellent conditions for playing chess, and a support mechanism in terms of chess engines and a wealth of books and the Internet to aid and develop our game. There was nothing like this for Vilner. What he did, he did by dint of hard work and talent alone. I felt that this man, ill as he was for much of his life, had chess as his constant friend and spirit guide. Without it, his life would surely have been diminished, not so much in a physical, but intellectual sense. So many of us can relate to this.

 

Vilner was the first Ukrainian chess champion, and the games are interesting, because he clearly had a good feel for tactics. Tkachenko gently and skillfully helps the reader to comprehend what is happening. Personally, I enjoy looking through games from this epoch because they do contain errors (not the cold and compliant slavery of computer moves even if they are superior) and one can begin to grasp the style of chess played at that time and how for example openings were explored and developed.

 

Here he was White against Pogrebyssky at Odessa in 1928 and this position was arrived at after 1.d4 d5 2.Nc3 Nf6 3.Bg5 c6 4. Qd3

 

Vilner plays the Veresov. I wonder how many people would play move today? Well, Hikaru Nakamura for one, in a Blitz game in 2019. It is just good fun looking at these openings and occasionally little gems can be found to perhaps employ in your own games later.

 

Then there are the compositions. Some of these are remarkable in their inventiveness and I can only wonder how Vilner actually devised them. Did they come to mind in the bath? Did he do them exclusively at the board, or did they appear at random?  

 

Here is one little example which was published in the Odessa News in 1913. It is White to play and mate in three. I shall provide the answer at the end of this review.

 

 

I felt some of Vilner’s frustration that his illness deprived him of even better results and more opportunities to play chess. I appreciated the inclusion of the rare photographs and drawings which enabled me to ‘step into’ his age.

 

The layout of this book is very good, with plenty of diagrams, photographs and results tables on good quality paper. It is a busy cover, but quite rightly an image of the man himself sits front and centre.

 

Does the book achieve its aim?

The book tells the world about Yakov Vilner’s life and his chess. It has been compiled after many years of hard graft and I am full of admiration for the player, the author and the Publisher on this one. It must have been a labour of love.

 

What really made this book worth reading is the fact that before I picked it up, I knew absolutely nothing about Yakov Vilner. When I finished it, I felt culturally enriched in a personal and chess sense. Tkachenko has done all the work, all you have to do is read and enjoy it.

 

Who is the author?

Sergei Tkachenko, a member of the Ukrainian team that won the 5th World Chess Composition tournament in 1997.

 

Answer to chess composition.

 

1.Ba8! e2 (only move) 2.Rb7! Kxg2 (only move) 3.Rh7#

This is lovely. When the bishop goes to a8, it will lie behind the critical b7 square which the rook will occupy, blocking any stalemate from a bishop check on g1. It paves the way for the rook’s mating ploy. This effect is the essence of the ‘Indian Theme.’ I love compositions like this, they are just so clever.