akiba rubinstein: uncrowned king

i just managed to pick up a copy of this book for £1.24 from amazon! i've been looking for a decent annotated collection of rubinsteins games for a while now, but they all seem to be out of print and selling for fairly high prices. 

has anyone read this book or have any opinions on it? i'm guessing it will be great for the games if nothing else. 

Congrats on the great deal. I, too, would be interested in feedback on this book from someone here in the community.

he would of been world champ. if not for his mentle illness. today they call it social phobia.

Have a look on www.schaakboek.nl for hundreds of books, would be a wonder when Rubinstein was not in between.

how could he have social phobia if you socialising in playing chess?

About Akiba Rubinstein, 1882-1961; one of the world's best four players from about 1907 to 1922 !

May I quote from The Oxford Companion of Chess : ... a lifelong shyness became almost pathological in his later years.  After making a move he would withdraw to a corner of the room, as though feeling his very presence gave offence.   His confidence was undermined, more than that of most masters, by the loss of a game.

His great successes in 1912 and 1922, stimulated by hopes of a championchip match, were followed, when the hopes faded, by dismal failures.  Unquote.

In Brace/Gligoric's Dictionary it says : Around 1919 Rubinstein's mental illness began. He was still capable of playing superb chess, but was unpredictably erratic.   .....  Very good results alternated with times when he would play extremely poorly and often commits inexplicable blunders.  ....   Throughout the years his mental illness worsened and his feelngs of paranoia grew ; he was steadily more uncommunicative. Unquote.

In 1932 he retired from chess competely and lived quietly in Brussel. 

We must not forget that many pages can be written, full of his great way of playing chess, also on World Champion level  !!!

Books : Rubinstein gewinnt ! by Kmoch, 1933, 100 games, reprinted 1941 ; and : Rubinstein's Chess Masterpieces, 1941.

thanks RomyGer this illness let him down. it can come on any time in life. but he lived with it in his younger day and played some great chess v all the top players at that time.

The author of that book is GM Seirawan right? Any book of Seirawan is a good read.

nah it's by john donaldson and nikolay minev.