I know John Watson and Eric Schiller had a small section on the Berlin in one of their books. not sure of the title, maybe someone else can assist? I am thinking it was "surviving and beating annoying openings", or something like that. Also the Complete Spanish by Suetin must have had some coverage.

Good luck with the book!!

Michael Goeller did a detailed bibliography of the Berlin Defense on the Kenilworthian Chess Club's blog.  http://www.kenilworthchessclub.org/kenilworthian/2006/09/ruy-lopez-berlin-defens...

IMJohnCox wrote on 01/11/07 at 10:22:52:


This line was in Tarrasch's repertoire, and there are some games in, um, Reinfeld's I think, collection of Tarrasch's games.  The games are of minor importance perhaps, but it's interesting that this notable champion of piece activity and space repeatedly played the queenless version of the Berlin.

Quote:


Andrew Brett may be referring to A. Martin's ChessBase DVD "The ABC of the Ruy Lopez" or somesuch which does, indeed, discuss 5.Re1.  I don't remember the games he quoted off the top of my head.

IMJohnCox wrote on 01/11/07 at 14:02:25:

Cant help you with the french spelling, I guess it is just rigeur 

Nf6 indeed usually isnt found in the Bird and is supposedly less optimal. On the other hand it is not easy for white to win. Against one of my clubmates whose rating is somewhere around 2200 (I am not even 2000) I played an evening of blitz with the following variation 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 Nf6 4.0-0 Nd4 5.Nxd4 exd4 (we wanted to know if we could mix the bird and berlin properly). He beat me twice as white, but I got him really frustrated with about 3 draws as black.

I understand your point, just be aware they can transpose. Eg 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 Nf6 4.d3 Nd4 (if the Bird isnt refuted this cant be bad). Now personally I dont think 5.Nxd4 gives enough, so that 5.Nc3 is definately an option leading to a strange mix of the Berlin, Bird and 4knights.

IMJohnCox wrote on 01/11/07 at 12:53:58:

No he just mentions he used to play these childish openings (Vienna and the likes) but that he switched to the Ruy because it is such a good opening and that he never turned back

His chapter on the Berlin is quite good in the explanation department (basically some themes in the endgame), but it may be a bit outdated theorywise.

PS why not 4.Nc3? For example the 4.d3 lines can often transpose as well. Just look what happens to our blatter-impaired WC Berlin specialist against Svidler:
[[Event "Dortmund final"]
[Site "Dortmund"]
[Date "2004.07.29"]
[Round "1"]
[White "Svidler,Peter"]
[Black "Kramnik,Vladimir"]
[Result "1-0"]
[Eco "C48"]
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 Nf6 4.d3 Bc5 5.Nc3 d6 6.0-0 0-0 7.Na4 Bb6 8.Nxb6 axb6 9.c3 h6 10.h3 Bd7 11.Ba4 Re8 12.Bb3 Be6 13.Bc2 d5 14.a3 dxe4 15.dxe4 Bc4 16.Re1 Qxd1 17.Rxd1 Na5 18.Nd2 Be6 19.b4 Nc4 20.Nxc4 Bxc4 21.a4 Red8 22.Be3 Ne8 23.f4 exf4 24.Bxf4 Be6 25.e5 Kf8 26.Be3 Rxd1+ 27.Rxd1 h5 28.Kf2 g6 29.Kf3 Ng7 30.g4 Bc4 31.Bh6 Kg8 32.Bg5 c6 33.Rd7 Bd5+ 34.Kg3 hxg4 35.hxg4 Rb8 36.Be3 Ne6 37.Bxb6 Kg7 38.Bd3 Bb3 39.a5 Ba4 40.Bc4 Ng5
41.Be3 c5 42.Rc7 Ne4+ 43.Kf3  1-0