As a librarian and bibliophile, part of the appeal of chess for me is that there is a seemingly endless number of books on the subject. Just reading about them or hearing them spoken about on YouTube is immensely enjoyable. But here I’m going to write about another genre of chess resource that has given me priceless knowledge in a most pleasurable way. First and foremost for me is Ben Johnson’s Perpetual Chess. Ben is a joy to listen to, not least because he is a a very thoughtful and conscientious host and interviewer. He rotates the subject of his pods among three themes: interviews of chess champions and personalities, interviews of adult chess improvers, and recaps of books (!). For the book recaps, he usually focuses on a classic chess book, which both he and his guest reread in preparation for the episode so that they can have an in-depth discussion. For the adult improver, one of the best things he does regarding books is to talk about what rating level of chess player it is good for. One reason this is important is that many of the most discussed chess books are not for players with ratings under 1000, sometimes not even for those under 1500 or 2000. It is easy to get caught up in someone’s praise of a chess book and buy it only to discover that it is barely comprehensible for you at your current level (yes, I am speaking from extensive personal experience), The ancillary material Ben provides for Perpetual Chess is also incomparably thorough. He even provides a list of the books recapped, which includes the readers’ recommended rating. His podcast notes are the best, bar none, too!
You won’t be surprised to hear that Ladies Knight is another favorite pod of mine. Its creator, Jennifer Shahade, is my favorite chess player; I’ll publish a post about her and her wonderful new book, Chess Queens, soon. One of her many hats is as the director of women’s programs for US Chess. On the pod she interviews prominent women with connections to chess, most of whom you will not have heard of, which is one of the excellent reasons to give this a listen. Jennifer is a very good listener who thoughtfully steers the conversation into directions unearthed by the interviewee’s latest response.
Other podcasts I enjoy listening to include Daniel Lona’s Chess Experience and Kevin Scull’s Chess Journeys. We chess learners are very lucky that so many people take the time to share their chess journeys with us in this form. There are many more out there; feel free to leave a comment about your own favorites
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