New Book on Senchi

John Fairbairn · #1

My latest book is now available on the Createspace estore (http://www.createspace.com) and will also be available via Amazon in a few days.

It is "Peerless Pioneer - Game of the Great Senchi: Yasui VII Senkaku", $6.95.

It is a small book, with six commentaries by Kato Shin and some extra games. Partly it was meant to introduce a hugely neglected Edo player who is nevertheless considered the Father of Modern Go, and also to pay homage to Kato. But to a considerable degree this project was about me trying to set up a template, both as regards text and software, so that I could produce bigger books on a conveyor belt in the most economical format practicable.

It's not perfect (I'm not getting onto individual page design) and I haven't quite ironed out all the bugs in the conveyor belt. E.g. CreateSpace offers a 7" x 10" format, as here, but Word doesn't - it has a slightly different B5 format. In theory Word lets you set up a custom size of 7x10, but has the nasty habit of resetting your document to B5 when it thinks you aren't looking. Still, I think the prototype can now be put on the table for inspection.

jeromie · #2

Thank you, John, for your many contributions to the go community. I hope this new method eases your work flow!

tchan001 · #3

Looking forward to your new book. Will be a great addition to the rare book set I have on his games.
Games of the Sage – Yasui Senchi (2 volumes)
先哲之譜　安井仙知 (上下巻)

Dontbtme · #4

Will it be also available as a Kindle ebook on Amazon?

I loved your series on Shuei and 'Invicible' by John Power, and I'd really like to have commented games of all the masters from the Edo period, to have an understanding of the evolution of Go fuseki and Joseki...
One such Japanese series from the seventies, which is sadly out of print, is the 日本囲碁大系, which would mean, if I'm not mistaken, something like 'Japanese Go survey', and which is composed of 18 books on the four houses masters (from Honinbo Sansa to Honinbo Shusai). Volume 3 in particular interests me very much: in it, Go Seigen reviews the games of Dousaku. :shock:

I don't think we'll ever have a translation of these or that they will be reprinted in Japanese either, though... :sad:

What would also interest me a lot would be a book on joseki evolution, stating what were their earlier versions (in the Edo Period) and why they were discarded and modified along the centuries, with some historical games exemplifying the shortcomings of such discarded joseki... :study:

Anyway, those dreams of mine are the reason why I'm really interested in your work. So thank you for all of it! :bow:

gowan · #5

All the books of the Nihon Igo Taikei are available from the used book store Akashiya Shoten (http://www.akasiya-shoten.com/) which specializes in go books. I think they will sell overseas.

John Fairbairn · #6

Quote:

Will it be also available as a Kindle ebook on Amazon?

I don't know. This option came up in the publication process, but required an extra special cover. At that point I just blanked out.

Quote:

I loved your series on Shuei and 'Invicible' by John Power, and I'd really like to have commented games of all the masters from the Edo period, to have an understanding of the evolution of Go fuseki and Joseki...
One such Japanese series from the seventies, which is sadly out of print, is the 日本囲碁大系, which would mean, if I'm not mistaken, something like 'Japanese Go survey', and which is composed of 18 books on the four houses masters (from Honinbo Sansa to Honinbo Shusai). Volume 3 in particular interests me very much: in it, Go Seigen reviews the games of Dousaku. :shock:

I don't think we'll ever have a translation of these or that they will be reprinted in Japanese either, though... :sad:

What would also interest me a lot would be a book on joseki evolution, stating what were their earlier versions (in the Edo Period) and why they were discarded and modified along the centuries, with some historical games exemplifying the shortcomings of such discarded joseki... :study:

The 日本囲碁大系 series is wonderful to have on your shelf - my set is beaming at me from over the room as I type. But in commentary terms it's probably vastly overrated. Even pros criticised Go Seigen's volume on Dosaku (allegedly didn't understand Dosaku's uniqueness), and in general for most of the volumes famous names were picked out as commentators simply because they were famous rather than for having any special historical insight. The parts of these books to treasure are the historical notes by Hayashi Yutaka. For the commentaries you are better served by older no-komi people like Kato Shin and Iwamoto Kaoru (mostly in magazines) or by the smaller series 古典名局選集, where the commentators show more empathy and (though not always) attempt to show the evolution of a player's contribution. I think these very affordable books may also be available as Nihon Ki-in e-books, and at least some have been translated into Chinese.

Although not part of a series, the various works of Fukui Masaaki on old games are outstanding (usually minimal but always highly perceptive comments), and he has also produced the very work on josekis you seek: a dictionary of the evolution of josekis (明快！定石誕生事典) - small but highly recommendable.

My own efforts at the moment are focused on converting and updating some of my smartgo books to print (especially the games of Shuei - I now have over 50% more commentaries, so that will take a while).

RobertJasiek · #7

John Fairbairn wrote:

My own efforts at the moment are focused on converting and updating some of my smartgo books to print

Great! I am the most interested in Gateway to All Marvels.

Dontbtme · #8

John Fairbairn wrote:

For the commentaries you are better served [...] by the smaller series 古典名局選集, where the commentators show more empathy and (though not always) attempt to show the evolution of a player's contribution. I think these very affordable books may also be available as Nihon Ki-in e-books, and at least some have been translated into Chinese.

Although not part of a series, the various works of Fukui Masaaki on old games are outstanding (usually minimal but always highly perceptive comments), and he has also produced the very work on josekis you seek: a dictionary of the evolution of josekis (明快！定石誕生事典) - small but highly recommendable.

Thanks a lot! :bow:

Those are exactly what I was looking for!

I checked Amazon and now my problem will be to choose what to order first (after 明快！定石誕生事典

)
Thanks, thanks and thanks

oren · #9

John Fairbairn wrote:

For the commentaries you are better served by older no-komi people like Kato Shin and Iwamoto Kaoru (mostly in magazines) or by the smaller series 古典名局選集, where the commentators show more empathy and (though not always) attempt to show the evolution of a player's contribution. I think these very affordable books may also be available as Nihon Ki-in e-books, and at least some have been translated into Chinese.

https://e-gobooks.nihonkiin.or.jp/produ ... ory_id=417

I assume this is the one. I've glanced at this page a couple times but I'm working my way through the Go World and Sakata books first.

Dontbtme · **#10**

About the NihonKiin ebooks, I tried to use their Android app 'e碁BOOKS' many months ago, but it didn't work because I wasn't in Japan (same problem I have with kindle)...
Looking back now, they don't even mention this app anymore, but they talk abouyt using Google Chrome on Windows (though not the 10 version): did anyone not in Japan had a successful experience with reading their ebooks that way?

oren · **#11**

Dontbtme wrote:

About the NihonKiin ebooks, I tried to use their Android app 'e碁BOOKS' many months ago, but it didn't work because I wasn't in Japan (same problem I have with kindle)...
Looking back now, they don't even mention this app anymore, but they talk abouyt using Google Chrome on Windows (though not the 10 version): did anyone not in Japan had a successful experience with reading their ebooks that way?

I use chrome. I did manage to get the apk for e-gobooks, but it's worse than running in chrome. Reloads take longer and game boards are missing symbols.

For chrome in Android select 'request desktop site' when it loads.

pitirre · **#12**

I haven't finished the book but I'm enjoying it a lot. The plays are great, the commentaries very helpful, the price of the ebook is stupendous... And for my kindle that I dearly love. I hope more go books for kindle are available in the near future.

DrStraw · **#13**

pitirre wrote:

I haven't finished the book but I'm enjoying it a lot. The plays are great, the commentaries very helpful, the price of the ebook is stupendous... And for my kindle that I dearly love. I hope more go books for kindle are available in the near future.

I was looking on Amazon for Japanese language go books and it seemed like all the had was kindle books. Begone with them. I was to read a book at bedtime, not be bombarded with electronics which disrupt my sleep patterns.

tchan001 · **#14**

DrStraw wrote:

I was looking on Amazon for Japanese language go books and it seemed like all the had was kindle books.

No, I just received my last order of physical Japanese language go books from Amazon.jp a couple days ago.

New Book on Senchi

Who is online