Exactly what constitutes a chess problem, is, to a degree, open to debate. However, the kinds of things published in the problem section of chess magazines, in specialist chess problem magazines, and in collections of chess problems in book form, tend to have certain common characteristics:
Table of contents |
2 Beauty in chess problems 3 Example problem 4 Further reading 5 External links |
There are various different types of chess problem:
Types of problem
All the above may also be found in forms of fairy chess - chess played with unorthodox rules, possibly using fairy pieces (unorthodox pieces).
In addition, there is the study, in which the stipulation is that white to play must win or draw. Almost all studies are endgame positions. Because the study is composed it is related to the problem, but because the stipulation is open-ended (the win or draw does not have to be achieved within any particular number of moves) it is usually thought of as separate from the problem. However, particularly long more-movers sometimes have the character of a study - there is no clear dividing line between the two.
In all the above types of problem, castling is assumed to be allowed unless it can be proved by retrograde analysis (see below) that the rook in question or king must have previously moved. En passant captures, on the other hand, are assumed not to be allowed, unless it can be proved that the pawn in question must have moved two squares on the previous move.
There are several other types of chess problem which do not follow the usual chess pattern of two sides playing moves towards checkmate. Some of these, like the knight's tour are essentially one-offs, but other types have been revisited many times, with magazines, books and prizes being dedicated to them:
There are no official standards by which to distinguish a beautiful problem from a poor one, and judgement varies from individual to individual as well as from generation to generation, but modern taste generally recognizes the following elements as being important if a problem is to be regarded as beautiful:
The key move is Rh1. The key difficult to find, because it makes no threat -- instead, it put black in zugzwang, a situation where every move is worse than no move, but move he must! Each of black's nineteen legal replies allows an immediate mate. For example, if black defends with 1...Bxh7, the d5 square is no longer guarded, and white mates with 2.Nd5#. Or if black plays 1...Re5, he blocks that escape square for his king allowing 2.Qg4#. Yet if black could pass (i.e. make no move at all) white would have no way to mate on his second move.
The thematic approach to solving is then to notice that in the original position, black is already almost in zugzwang. If black were compelled to play first, only Re3 and Bg5 would not allow immediate mate. However, each of those two moves blocks a critical escape square for the black king (a flight square), and once white has removed his rook from h2 he can put some other piece on that square to deliver mate: 1...Re3 2. Bh2# and 1...Bg5 2.Qh2#.
The arrangement of the black rooks and bishops, with a pair of adjacent rook flanked by a pair of bishops, is known to problemists as Organ Pipes. This arrangement means the black pieces get in the way of each other: for example, consider what happens after the key if black plays 1...Bf7. White now mates with 2.Qf5#, a move which is only possible because the bishop black moved has got in the way of the rook's guard of f5 - this is known as a self-interference. Similarly, if black tries 1...Rf7, this interferes with the bishop's guard of d5, meaning white can mate with Nd5#. Mutual interferences like this, between two pieces on one square, are known as Grimshaw interferences. There are several Grimshaw interferences in this problem.
Example problem
The following is a problem composed by T. Taverner in 1881. It is a directmate, with white to move and mate in 2:Further reading
External links