Talk:Paul Morphy

"Unofficial world champion"

This term is basically bullshit. If you're talking about the strongest player in the world, there were plenty of "unofficial world champions" before him (e.g. Philidor, Labourdonnais). I propose we excise it from the lead. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 08:30, 14 January 2023 (UTC)

The cited reference says: "According to David Lawson, in Paul Morphy, The Pride and Sorrow of Chess, Mckay, 1976. Lawson says that Morphy was the first world champion to be so acclaimed at the time he was playing. Most chess historians, however, place the first official world chess championship in 1886."

In old edits, the lead paragraph said "He is considered to have been the greatest chess master of his era and is often considered the unofficial World Chess Champion." I agree that's clunky and vague and doesn't really say anything. Therefore I changed the sentence to: "He is considered to have been the greatest chess master of his era. He was the first player to have been regarded as the World Chess Champion, despite the first official world championship taking place in 1886." (This leaves no room for interpretation.)

Currently the user MaxBrowne2 is arguing that the entire segment should be removed, but it's been there since at least 2012 uncontested until my edit.

IAmNobody24 is also pushing for MaxBrowne2's revision on grounds that the source is unreliable. 24.68.69.54 (talk) 08:53, 14 January 2023 (UTC)

Length of time is irrelevant. "Unofficial world champion" is still meaningless. "World's leading chess player" means something. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 10:12, 14 January 2023 (UTC)

The current contested revision of the article doesn't actually use the wording "unofficial world champion". It explains he was regarded by people as being the world champion at the time of his career, despite the official world championships not existing yet. This was the true sentiment of the time as explained by Lawson. People actually called him the World Champion as competitive chess existed back then. It was partly his influence in the sport that gave rise to official world championships, so his life is inexorably tied together with the world championship title. 24.68.69.54 (talk) 10:21, 14 January 2023 (UTC)

I kicked over this hornet's nest (with this edit), and I think that my edit was correct, but it will be at least half a day, if not more, before I can get around to defending it in this space. Bruce leverett (talk) 12:04, 14 January 2023 (UTC)

My only problem with your version is that it says he "was sometimes described" as the World Chess Champion but links the page for the actual objective concept of the World Chess Champion. At least when it says he was "the first player to have been regarded as the World Chess Champion", it matches the cited reference, and it feels less like a general description and more like the actual thing that he was, which the official championships were built to formalize. World Champion was not a nickname or anything, he was actually regarded as the world champion of chess as a competitive sport before the title was formalized. 24.68.69.54 (talk) 12:35, 14 January 2023 (UTC)

Your point about the wikilink to World Chess Championship is well taken. This article is a biography of Morphy, not a history of the WCC. It doesn't help the reader, and may even confuse the reader, to refer to the Steinitz-Zukertort match of 1886, and to link to the article about events that proceeded from that match.

I also don't think the words "official" and "unofficial" belong here. We tend to take for granted that we have a governing body for chess and that it jealously guards the rights to the World Champion title, but that's only since 1948. The only thing Steinitz and Zukertort could use to back up up their claim that it was a WC match was their own credibility. That, and the fact that world travel was by then slightly less time-consuming, arduous, risky, and expensive than it had been before. Zukertort actually traveled to the United States for the match. Before then, e.g. at the time of Staunton's match with St. Amant, the claim that it was a World Championship match was occasionally made, but it didn't get traction. What about the Germans? Or even the Russians?

Any sport is more prestigious if it is organized enough to have a World Champion. As noted by Lawson, various people claimed that Morphy was the World Champion, and in doing so, they were not just saying how strong he was, but how well-developed the chess scene was. Morphy made great strides toward creating a World Championship, not only by beating everybody, but also by crossing the Atlantic, and then even going to Germany. But for his own reasons, he didn't want the title, and so things generally lapsed until after he had died.

Lastly, the word "first" is not accurate. See Winter's article for examples of people claiming that Staunton was WC, or (in 1850) that the winner of the upcoming 1851 tournament would be WC. I don't know if this inaccuracy is due to Lawson, or whether we are just misquoting him, as I don't have Lawson's book handy, but in any case, we can't use that word. Bruce leverett (talk) 20:51, 14 January 2023 (UTC)

Perhaps the information should not be removed or softened, but rather moved further down into the article. It would be more interesting to include it alongside Morphy's own apprehension about the title, since, like you said, it's an article about Morphy, not the WCC. I think at this point there's at least enough consensus to keep the information in the article, the form it's in doesn't matter much. 24.68.69.54 (talk) 02:07, 15 January 2023 (UTC)

I have edited the opening paragraphs. I didn't add anything (about, for example, the later Steinitz-Zukertort match) to the body of the article, but you are welcome to try to do it in a way that helps the reader to understand Morphy's legacy. Bruce leverett (talk) 05:41, 15 January 2023 (UTC)

I'm unhappy with the edit, I feel it removes a lot of information, and the reference was completely gutted. I disagree that what you removed was unjustified. "Sometimes described as" (described by who?) is far too vague without the specific claims from the reference. But I'll leave it to someone else to fix it if they wish. There are too many cooks now, all I originally wanted to do with my original edit was touch up the wording. 24.68.69.54 (talk) 09:39, 15 January 2023 (UTC)

I've went ahead and removed the sentence altogether, since it's been diluted by these edits to the point where it's vague and unfocused, and I feel like the previous sentence (that he was considered the greatest chess master of his era) is sufficient. I just don't feel comfortable with the statement in its current form being in the introduction, it feels sloppy.

For what it's worth, I believe there's evidence that this whole debate was useless. I've found a page titled List of World Chess Championships#Unofficial Championships (before 1886). It turns out "unofficial world champion" was perfectly fine all along (despite MaxBrowne2's protests) since that is an actual specification used when describing the history of chess. I of course never had any problem with this language.

I will therefore suggest that another editor restores one of the earlier versions of the lead paragraph if there's consensus in the future. But I say the controversial sentence should just be removed for now, since it's negatively affecting the quality of the article. 24.68.69.54 (talk) 00:52, 16 January 2023 (UTC)

This outcome is OK with me. I was no fan of the stuff about "was sometimes described as the World Champion", I was only trying to make it less obtrusive, but I didn't have the nerve to remove it altogether as you have done. Bruce leverett (talk) 03:28, 16 January 2023 (UTC)

Working on the article

I have acquired a copy of the 2010 edition of Lawson, and I am trying to use it to improve the citations in the article.

Other things being equal, a secondary source such as Lawson is a better reference than a tertiary source. However, the first edition of Lawson, which was published in 1976, may have been harder to obtain when this article was first written than some tertiary sources. So at that time, editors may have been tempted to cite tertiary sources, but now, Lawson should be routinely cited.

As detailed by Lawson on pages 226-7, the pamphlet by Buck about Morphy introduced a number of historical errors, which have been widely copied (even by Sergeant), and can be found in some of our tertiary sources; for example, as I write this, we are quoting some article that gave 1882 as the date of the incident in which Morphy's family tried to take him to the "Louisiana Retreat". This is another reason to cite Lawson whenever possible. Bruce leverett (talk) 02:02, 7 March 2023 (UTC)

Löwenthal game score issue

Two different scores for a game played between Morphy and Löwenthal in 1850 have been published. In one score, submitted by Ernest Morphy to various chess periodicals in 1856, Morphy won the game; in the other score, published by Löwenthal in his collection of Morphy's games in 1860, Morphy achieved a winning endgame but went astray and allowed a draw.

Sergeant (Sergeant 1957, pp. 210-212) uses the version published by Löwenthal. Lawson (Lawson 2010, pp. 21-32) discusses the discrepancy at length, strenuously arguing that Löwenthal's version must be incorrect, and referring to it as a "gross error", while implying that it may not have been just an error, but the result of outright dishonesty. But Lawson apparently does not even consider the possibility that it might have been Ernest Morphy, not Löwenthal, who fudged the game score.

I have modified the article to take a neutral position between Sergeant and Lawson on this question, in accordance with WP:N. Bruce leverett (talk) 03:44, 20 June 2023 (UTC)

Tables of results

I have organized the single table of results into several tables, while trying to verify entries against reliable sources. I have removed entries about blindfold games and consultation games. The following entries have been changed or removed:

T. Ayers -- We were calling him "A.D. Ayers", presumably copied from chessgames.com. The link indirected to an article mentioning a baseball umpire by that name of the 1870's. Lawson identifies him only as "Dr. Ayers". Edo identifies him as "T. Ayers"; I do not know which primary source, if any, they got that name from.

Fiske, Fuller, and Perrin -- This was of course a consultation game.

Jean Adolphe Laroche -- We were calling him "H. Laroche", and Lawson identifies him only as "Laroche" or "M. Laroche", but Edo identifies him as "J.A. Laroche", and chessgames.com has an entry for "Jean Adolphe Laroche" that aligns him with Lawson's references to Laroche.

Chamouillet -- This was a blindfold consultation game (mentioned by Edge).

St. Amant -- The only known game is a consultation game.

De Riviere and Journoud -- A consultation game.

Bousserolles -- A blindfold game.

Schrüfer -- I have corrected the spelling by adding an umlaut, and by spelling his first name. Sergeant does not give his full name, only quoting a source that calls him "S---r", but chessgames.com identifies him as Schrüfer.

George Hammond, 1859 -- this was a consultation game.

Augustus Mongredien, 1863 -- Lawson says that Morphy played games with Mongredien in Paris in 1863, but I cannot find a source for the results and/or scores.

(added later:)

Löwenthal, 1859 -- We were giving a score of 1 win, 1 loss, and 2 draws, but I do not see any source that gives that score; I have gone with 1 win, 1 loss, and 1 draw.

Arnous de Rivière, 1863 -- We were giving a score of 9-3, but Edo scorns this in favor of 13-5. The games presented in Sergeant are 9 wins and 2 losses.

I have avoided using the term "casual". Nowadays this means any game not played for stakes or played in a tournament or formal match. But in Morphy's day, tournaments were not common. Games serious enough to warrant keeping score, and publishing the score in a magazine, were played in settings that we would now call "casual". Bruce leverett (talk) 02:05, 9 October 2023 (UTC)

Further reading

@AirshipJungleman29: Thanks for bringing this to my attention. I will restore some of the sources you have removed, but I will bring the section into line with WP:Further reading, which is not official policy, but looks reasonable to me.

I will put all the "Further reading" items standard citation format, using citation templates.

Items that are cited in the text, such as Beim, will be moved up to the "References" section. This includes the pamphlet by Regina Morphy-Voitier.

I will not restore the fictional items, nor the tertiary histories (Schonberg and Fine), nor the foreign language works (Maroczy, Vazquez, Caparros). Caparros is a complete game collection, and I thought of restoring it, but Shibut is also a complete game collection, and is in English.

I am inclined to restore Sergeant's "Morphy Gleanings". I haven't read it, but Sergeant's earlier book is an important source. The fact that "Morphy Gleanings" was reprinted by Dover suggests that it is important.

I am also inclined to restore Löwenthal, because it is historically important (it is mentioned in footnote 12), and is easily available online.

I am inclined to remove Frisco Del Rosario. I haven't read it, but I suspect that it is tangential to this biographical article.

Bruce leverett (talk) 22:15, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

While not policy, MOS:FURTHER is part of MOS:LAYOUT, a guideline required for GA status, which I see this article is nominated for. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 23:51, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

A couple of corrections:

The book by Chris Ward, contrary to our earlier annotation, is not fiction, but is a biography. I have not read it myself, nor evaluated it for suitability for this "Further reading" section.

I do not plan to add the pamphlet by Regina Morphy-Voitier to the "References" section. Keeping it in the "Notes" section should be fine.

Bruce leverett (talk) 21:17, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

Euwe on Morphy

We are quoting Euwe saying that Morphy was "... a chessgenius in the complete sense of the word." However, we aren't citing Euwe directly, but are citing him as quoted by Valery Beim. I would like to find the original source of this quotation -- perhaps it is in Euwe's book "The Development of Chess Style"? It would be better to cite something by Euwe than to cite somebody else quoting Euwe, because one could be sure that Euwe's words were correctly quoted, and one would have a publication date and other context. Bruce leverett (talk) 20:03, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

Well, I see from re-reading Beim that he cites a 1937 issue of the Soviet periodical 64 to quote Euwe. As a practical matter, this may not be easily accessible to readers, so it would be OK that we are citing Beim instead. Bruce leverett (talk) 20:21, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Paul Morphy/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Remsense (talk · contribs) 07:34, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

As a subject that I've done more than a bit of personal off-wiki research on, I'm snapping this up as my first GAN review with considerable pleasure.

GA review (see here for what the criteria are, and here for what they are not)
It is reasonably well written. a (prose, spelling, and grammar): b (MoS for lead, layout, word choice, fiction, and lists): It is factually accurate and verifiable. a (references): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR): d (copyvio and plagiarism): It is broad in its coverage. a (major aspects): b (focused): It follows the neutral point of view policy. Fair representation without bias: It is stable. No edit wars, etc.: It is illustrated by images, where possible and appropriate. a (images are tagged and non-free images have fair use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):
Overall: Pass/Fail:
· · ·

Remsense留 07:34, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

formatting/cosmetic tweaks

I'm doing some while I review, to the reference list, tables, and so on. of course, they are not necessary to the review, I just can't help myself. if they are in any way objectionable please don't hesitate to let me know! Remsense留 09:08, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

Some comments or objections:

I prefer "games played at odds" to "games featuring odds". The former is closer to the terminology used back when chess was frequently played at odds.

"winning each match by lopsided margins" -- this is a singular vs. plural mismatch, which is why I used "winning matches ... by lopsided margins". That needs to be fixed, but you don't have to fix it the way I did.

"by his contemporaries and later generations alike" -- verbose and generally unnecessary, or were you really trying to say something here?

"A chess prodigy lacking formal training, Morphy emerged onto the nascent semi-professional chess scene in 1857 by dominating ..." -- a couple of problems here. We don't know if Morphy had "formal training"; Lawson doesn't mention any, but one can't prove a negative. Since we have already noted that there wasn't yet a world championship, "nascent semi-professional" is redundant, and distracting. I don't mind the use of the word "dominating"; but altogether, this whole sentence looks too florid. I believe in letting the facts speak for themselves.

It is misleading to say that Morphy spent "several years" touring England and France, etc. The actual time during which he was challenging his peers was less than a whole year. True, he went back to Europe in the 1860's, but he was long past his actual chess career by then.

Switching from "called" to "dubbed" is artificial, not exactly a violation of MOS:SAID but comparable.

"tempestuous" -- where did this come from? I thought Morphy just dropped out of chess. Indeed his tour of the U.S. upon returning in 1859 was more like a graceful farewell.

Notable games -- I am uncomfortable with not giving the first names of the opponents here. This section is not part of the narrative, so one can't assume that a reader coming to it has read the rest of the article and knows who is who.

I may take more than a day reviewing your changes, so for now I am just commenting, rather than going in and reverting, but I will be happy to do the latter eventually. Bruce leverett (talk) 03:33, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

I'll do my best to fix all my own changes—I'm supposed to be the reviewer here, and while I can't help myself, I don't want to make a bigger mess for others. Remsense留 04:18, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

Apologies if my initial flurry was a bit overeager, I hope you don't mind the initial back and forth. I think you're right for most of these, excepting that I think "games featuring odds" or another modern phraseology is the proper move—while it's not the terminology used at the time, we are writing for a modern audience and use comparably updated terms elsewhere. If you're not convinced, I'll happily revert those too and get on with reviewing.

For additional style considerations: in the transcripts of the games, i'm concerned by the use of MOS:BOLD, would you mind if I attempt to tweak it, keeping it equally distinctive and information-dense? Remsense留 04:31, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

Also, you'll have to forgive my bad habit of going from memory of sources in this particularly bad context for it—I should've had taken out my copy of Lawson from the start, but had neglected to do so while I was still "copy editing"—I'll be more immediately scrupulous from here. Remsense留 21:48, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

For some reason I neglected to reply to this. I definitely prefer "at odds", and I don't think it's old-fashioned, but I'll try to find some more modern examples of it before I do anything. Regarding the typefaces in the notable games, I do not feel like I am an authority on this; the most recent tweaks to them before this GA review were by Ihardlythinkso (talk · contribs), but I don't think that the recommendations in WP:CHESS#Conventions are much help with those issues. Bruce leverett (talk) 18:00, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

The reference editor ProveIt seems to sometimes incorrectly replace "author=X Y" with "last=X Y". (The correct replacement would be "last=Y | first=X".) Bruce leverett (talk) 04:04, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

Oh, I see that you caught this, thanks. Bruce leverett (talk) 04:06, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

Bruce leverett, yes! it's given me trouble before, so usually I remember to check for it. I think a patch for this is waiting to be implemented. Remsense留 04:15, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

In the citation of Fischer's article "The Ten Greatest Masters in History", note that the cited source, which is Brady's magazine "ChessWorld", gives Fischer's name as "Bobby Fischer". I think we have to adhere to this in our citation, and not change it to "Robert James Fischer". Bruce leverett (talk) 04:12, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

You're right—I suppose I just felt weird about having the hypocorism in the citation. Remsense留 04:16, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

I'm still going through the article line by line—but tonight I got distracted and added the book published by Fiske on the First American Chess Congress, among other things—there's an awful lot in this book that could be added to the article! It should be available to peruse via the Internet Archive url provided in the citation. What do you think? Remsense留 07:55, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

I hit the thank button before I looked at this. Can't wait to get around to looking at Fiske.

Need to think some more about that long sentence about Morphy's "legacy" in the lead pgph. I will go along with your judgment that it isn't encyclopedic to proclaim that he was far ahead of his time. If it looks like puffery to you, it's probably puffery. But at the same time, it is trivial, and doesn't require "agreement", to say that he was far ahead of his contemporaries. Bruce leverett (talk) 15:10, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

I think the point there is directly to ensure that it's keeping with the previous statement about disagreements. Perhaps it would make sense to swap the order of the two statements, so that the statement of his ability versus his peers can be plain, with disagreements about exactly what it means outside his era coming later? Remsense留 23:14, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Brooklyn Daily Eagle quote

There is some discussion in Lawson of how Morphy's reputation had reached New York well before he did, which I found thought-provoking, considering it was before the days of organized tournaments, let alone rating systems, etc. This can be seen on pp. 45-46 and 50-51. I would prefer to cite Lawson, rather than the Eagle, because (1) it is a (reliable) secondary source, and (2) one does not need to subscribe to Newspapers.com. Also, I would prefer to keep things chronological, by discussing this before the paragraph giving the results of the tournament, instead of at the end of that paragraph. Will get around to this late tomorrow. Bruce leverett (talk) 03:32, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

I think it is fairly healthy to include secondary sources sometimes (newspaper articles are secondary sources, it's just a secondary source from the period), especially when we are relying particularly strongly on a specific work like with Lawson. Would you like to include a cite for Lawson as well, perhaps bundled in the citation? Remsense留 03:38, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Steinitz

I have already been told to fix a "citation needed" tag in order to get to GA, so I figure that we must fix our own "verification needed" tag, too.

The question is, did Steinitz see Morphy in New Orleans in the 1860s, or did he not? Lawson says nothing about this, and suggests (p. 300) that they had not met until 1883. But from this edit [1], and this earlier edit [2], apparently Landsberger's biography of Steinitz claims that Steinitz met Morphy "in the 1860s". Without having read Landsberger, I would guess that he indeed made that claim, since another experienced editor put in a proper citation for it. But I have no way to evaluate Landsberger's claim, without seeing his book and looking at his sources.

If I cannot make progress with this, I would be inclined either to altogether remove the mention of Steinitz meeting Morphy in the 1860's, or to put it in a footnote, along with the "verification needed" tag. Bruce leverett (talk) 02:06, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Google Books did not enable me to find the reference to Steinitz meeting Morphy in Landsberger's 1993 book, but in Landsberger's 2002 compilation The Steinitz Papers, one can see in a footnote on page 39 that Landsberger thought that Steinitz had first met Morphy in 1883. So I am definitely inclined to discard the sentence that we have and the citation of Landsberger, but will wait a while to see if someone can correct me on this. Bruce leverett (talk) 02:59, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

I will remove the statement for now. Remsense留 06:20, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

14 December – Review

This was a great pick for my first GAN, I learned a lot doing it. Thank you to Bruce leverett for fixing up this article, for fixing up my mistakes when I started reviewing, and for being engaging throughout the process, and to MaxBrowne2 for their help during the review process as well.
Understandably, the biography of this article is built on the foundation of Lawson (1976; 2010), but there is a healthy body of independent, usually earlier works about his life and times that adds dimension and backs up most of the claims made in the article.
The other primary body of claims that require sourcing are the games, which are luckily well-documented and basically canonical in the chess tradition. The article is very no-nonsense (despite my attempts) yet it is clearly very valuable for someone wanting to learn about Morphy for the first time—I wish this article was in this state when I first learned about him.
Great work! I want to continue working on this article, but I've now gone through it in its entirety, and it clearly meets the criteria. Remsense留 06:33, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

My own first GA review was just a few months ago, Vera Menchik, and it too was one of those biographies where the author could and did rely heavily on one good book.

Thanks for your diligent work. I was also pleasantly surprised by your spiffing up of the tables and the References and Further reading. This of course had nothing to do with the GA criteria, but it all gave me the "Why didn't I think of that?" feeling. Bruce leverett (talk) 17:46, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

It's my specialty, the tables and tidying of cosmetics mostly for the editor—it's a real issue! :) Remsense留 22:20, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

World Championship

@Quale: Upon reflection, I agree that the lead paragraph should not mention future events like the chess world championship, but should concentrate on what made Morphy notable. I correct people all the time about putting inappropriate things in lead paragraphs.

I am not entirely comfortable with the phrase "world's greatest", but I will let it sit for a while, maybe someone else can think of something better.

It might be appropriate to bring up the World Championship in the body of the article, perhaps in the "Hailed as champion" section. First, because readers and other editors are always bringing it up. The grating phrase "unofficial world champion" frequently appears in this article and others. Second, because I have been struck by the fact that organized and professional chess were just getting started in this part of the 19th century: the first international tournament in 1851; national championships; the world championship formally in 1886; successful professional players and writers such as Steinitz and Blackburne. Sports, such as American baseball, were likewise starting to get organized and professionalized in the late 19th century. When Morphy told his audience during the New York testimonial dinner that "Chess never has been and never can be aught but a recreation", he wasn't taking an extreme or eccentric position, but was giving his listeners what he and they thought was hard-headed career advice; but the advice seems strange to us nowadays, because people have routinely made serious careers out of chess and sport, and that started happening soon after Morphy's retirement from chess. Bruce leverett (talk) 03:14, 20 December 2023 (UTC)

I don't see why it wouldn't be appropriate. Historical figures and events are placed in proper retrospect all the time in sources, and therefore in an encyclopedia. His prefiguring of the WCC is a really important part of his legacy. Remsense留 03:40, 20 December 2023 (UTC)

Well maybe "inappropriate" was not the most exact word.

The general rule, as noted in MOS:LEAD, is that "significant information should not appear in the lead if it is not covered in the remainder of the article." So when I dropped that bit about the World Championship into the first paragraph, I should at minimum have put a discussion of the future World Championship into the body of the article, as I suggested above.

But that has its own problems. As also noted in MOS:LEAD, "The lead is the first thing most people will read upon arriving at an article, and may be the only portion of the article that they read." I might add that many, many readers can be expected to know nothing about Morphy except his first and last name, and while those readers are annoyingly difficult to write for, they are the ones who have the keenest need for what Wikipedia has to offer. One must be extraordinarily careful about what goes into a lead section and in what order, in order that it be accessible to, and useful for, readers who are starting entirely from scratch. In particular, I am not sure I want to talk at this early part of the article about the distinction between having a "world's best chess player" and having a formal World Champion.

I like your word "prefiguring". I guess that by taking chess as seriously as he did, Morphy enabled his contemporaries, and later chess players, to contemplate seriously the idea of a formal World Championship. I do not know if one can make this point in the lead section. Bruce leverett (talk) 05:44, 20 December 2023 (UTC)

Morphy and 1.e4

In the 'Style of Play' section it states that Morphy 'usually opted for [1.e4]'. My understanding was that Morphy was exclusively a 1.e4 player, and reference to the databases at chesstempo.com and chessgames.com supports this idea.

I wonder if any editors have access to a definite source for the complete games of Paul Morphy and can confirm the issue one way or the other? Or, failing that, if anyone knows of any games where Morphy did not open with 1.e4? Axad12 (talk) 22:18, 21 February 2024 (UTC)

You are probably right. I'm looking at the "Index of Openings" at the end of Sergeant. Nothing but 1.e4 among the games in which he played White, except possibly those classified as "Irregular" -- I will look them up later when I have time.

Of course, to be prudent, one would have to look at the complete collection. There is a link to Krabbe's complete collection in the External Links, but it does not have an opening index, it's just a .PGN file. Bruce leverett (talk) 22:58, 21 February 2024 (UTC)

I have Sergeant's book on Morphy's games, which I believe is fairly comprehensive. I'll check to see if there's any record of Morphy ever playing a move other than 1.e4. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 23:32, 21 February 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for the responses above. Just a brief note to say that I've located some Morphy games where he played non 1.e4 openings when playing at odds. Others may disagree, but my feeling is that odds games don't really count for the purposes of the discussion here (on the basis that the 'Style of Play' section is talking about standard games, or at least would be construed to be doing so by most readers). Axad12 (talk) 23:56, 21 February 2024 (UTC)

He played 1.f4 in a few games against Thompson and 1.b3 in a few games against Maurian. Apparently he didn't like facing 1.e4 e6 when giving knight odds. MaxBrowne2 (talk) 23:58, 21 February 2024 (UTC)

Yes, those were the casual odds games I was referring to. I'm not convinced that they would invalidate a minor re-write along the lines of 'With the White pieces, Morphy opted exclusively for the King's Pawn Game [...]' (current version says 'usually opted'). Axad12 (talk) 00:11, 22 February 2024 (UTC)

I generally agree that "odds games don't count" in evaluating the claim that he always played 1.e4. It's good that you have brought this up, because it is pretty silly for us to be saying that he "usually" opted for 1.e4. (I probably wrote that.) In those days, 1.d4 and 1.c4 were much less frequently seen than they are now, and Morphy may not have been the only leading player who always used 1.e4. Bruce leverett (talk) 01:55, 22 February 2024 (UTC)

Thanks Bruce (and thanks for all your work on this page). Before making the suggestion above I made a not unrelated point about the White repertoire of Johannes Zuckertort. If yourself and Max have the time to look at the suggestion on Zuckertort's talk page it would be appreciated. Axad12 (talk) 03:46, 22 February 2024 (UTC)

"Kings Pawn Game", "Queen's Pawn Game", "Open Game"

These are not so much the names of openings as umbrella terms for whole families of openings. Saying "I played the King's Pawn Game" instead of just "I played 1.e4" sounds very odd to a chess player. It's like saying "I have a pet mammal" instead of "I have a pet dog". MaxBrowne2 (talk) 00:34, 22 February 2024 (UTC)

Yes, I tend to agree. In this case (prior to your edit) it used to say something like 'Morphy usually opted for the King's Pawn Game, often favouring gambits like the King's Gambit and Evans Gambit', which I suppose is sufficiently specific. If it had just said 'King's Pawn Game' then that wouldn't have been very helpful.

Seems to be a wider issue on Wikipedia. Perhaps it relates to the fact that there are articles called King's Pawn Game and Queen's Pawn Game, which as article titles are probably better than '1.e4' and '1.d4'. But that shouldn't get in the way of stating in natural language that 'a certain player played 1.e4', with a link to King's Pawn Game as you have done in your edit.

I do have slight reservations however, on the basis that most Wikipedia readers probably don't know algebraic notation. In which case 'Morphy usually opened with the King's Pawn' may be more accessible than 'usually opened with 1.e4'.

Agree however that 'King's Pawn GAME' is now probably an antiquated term that ought not to appear in article text when more natural alternatives are available. Axad12 (talk) 04:06, 22 February 2024 (UTC)

I wrote "King's pawn game" in this article. I do not remember clearly why I wrote it that way, but I may well have been concerned that, as suggested above, algebraic notation is not self-explanatory and not understandable to most Wikipedia readers. But that's what Wikilinks are for, so calling it "1.e4" and wikilinking to King's Pawn Game at least ameliorates that problem. In retrospect I agree that "king's pawn game" is not a suitable thing to say here, for the reason given by MaxBrowne2. Bruce leverett (talk) 05:05, 22 February 2024 (UTC)