On Wed, 31 Aug 2005 06:07:00 GMT, "Alan OBrien"
wrote:

I appreciate you sticking up for Schiller, but the paragraph you obkect to:

What I am objecting to is the following remarks by Camembert, "Many of
them have received scathing reviews: reviewing for the Chess Cafe,
Carsten Hansen said Schiller's tome on the Frankenstein-Dracula
Variation of the Vienna Game was "by far THE WORST BOOK I HAVE EVER
SEEN" [1], while Tony Miles' famous review of Unorthodox Chess
Openings for Kingpin consisted of two words: "Utter crap."

...is in fact entirely correct. I suppose you are saying that there should
be no mention of those two reviews. But for many of us that is what Schiller
is most famous for.


On 30 Aug 2005 23:29:31 -0700, "
wrote:

Schiller has written more good books than he is generally given credit
for, but Alan O'Brien's remark is rather fair.

Ten years or so ago, I remember making some deprecating remark about a
Schiller book (don't remember which one) which IMO was not good at all.
The next time I ran in to Eric, I felt obliged to reference the remark
and apologize: he good-naturedly said, "Don't worry, I'm used to it."

Schiller gave a scathing but just review of my recent play he
http://tinyurl.com/dagjx

Yes. I am saying that those two quotes from negative reviews should
not be included in any encyclopedia article. It would be perfectly OK
to add External Links to those negative reviews, However, if you read
an article in Encyclopedia Britannica, would you expect to find the
words "THE WORST BOOK I HAVE EVER SEEN" and "Utter crap"?

An encyclopedia article should deal in facts, not opinions. Calling a
Schiller book "Utter crap" is clearly an opinion. This comment should
be removed from Wikipedia.

If such a comment appears in a book review or in a newsgroup such as
rec.games.chess.politics, that is a different matter altogether,
because the expression of personal opinions is called for there. You
will notice that I have not complained about the more than one hundred
personal attacks Bill Brock has directed towards me on
rec.games.chess.politics, but I did object when Bill Brock attacked me
on Wikipedia encyclopedia.

Another pont is that Eric Schiller writes his books to be read by 1500
players. His purpose is to entertain and to teach a little about chess
while doing so. His book about the Frankenstein-Dracula Variation of
the Vienna Game is a perfect example. It is filled with quotes and
spoofs from Bram Stoker's Dracula and Mary Shelly's Frankenstein.
Naturally, a grandmaster like Miles or a FIDE Master like Hansen will
not like such a book, but Schiller knows that they were not going to
buy his book anyway. Schiller books are popular with lower-level
players, and that is his intended audience.

I am also annoyed at the name "Frankenstein-Dracula
Variation" of the Vienna Game. I looked this up and discovered that
this is an opening I have been playing for Black since the early
1960s. I played the black side of this opening to defeat master Don
Sutherland in the 1964 Northern California Championship at the
Mechanics Institute in San Francisco. Who gave anybody the right to
rename this old opening the Frankenstein-Dracula Variation of the
Vienna Game?

By the way, is "Alan OBrien" the same person as Camembert?

Sam Sloan