Basic Chess Endings

Grandmaster Reuben Fine wrote this survey of chess endgames, which appeared in 1941 and is regarded as the earliest systematic English-language book on that phase of the game. Its chapters run from the elementary mates through king and pawn, knight, bishop and minor piece endings to rook and pawn endings, rook against minor pieces and queen endings, then a summary and twenty rules for the endgame. Fine created many of the example positions himself. The original used descriptive notation. Readers later found more than a hundred errors, and Pal Benko revised it in 2003, switching to algebraic notation and adding new analysis and examples. Mikhail Botvinnik, the world champion, rated it the finest endgame book.

Tyler Cowen named it among books with a hidden influence on him, though he credits less the book itself than a long run of Chess Life and Review articles exposing holes in its analysis.