Xuanxuan Qijing

    Keywords: Problem, Culture & History, Books & Publications

玄玄棋经

Classic Chinese problem collection, known in Japanese as Gen Gen Go Kyo.

Published 1347, authors Yan Defu and Yan Tianzhang.


Floris?: Does anyone know where you can purchase a copy? I'd really like to own this book.

Niklaus: You can find the problems online, for example [ext] here, but I guess you're after a real dead tree book. I tried finding it at [ext] http://dangdang.com, the biggest chinese online bookstore, but couldn't find it there. A google search turned up an ISBN number (7-80511-757-8), a publisher (shanghai wenhua 上海文化), and a price (28 元, which would be about 4 Euro) but I didn't find a way to order anything from that site, and it's doubtful they would ship to Europe anyway...

John F. You are entering murky waters as there are many versions. You can buy a copy of the original Japanese edition of 1642 for 500,000 yen, but it only has 166 problems. Modern Japanese editions mostly follow this. The best modern version, because it had 347 problems (but omitted other things), was a Korean one, but it is long out of print and the publisher has folded. (Actually they called themselves after this book!)

I'm not 100% up on Chinese editions, but the ones I have are far from complete collections. However, the benefit of these, as of the modern Japanese editions, is that the pros have corrected the faulty solutions (there aren't too many of them, but if you don't know which they are, you are forever wondering about _all_ the problems. (The Korean edition, which is the basis of the online problems, is uncorrected).

So you have to decide whether you are a collector or you just want the problems. If the latter, bear in mind that most of the problems turn up elsewhere, though usually without the names.

On this latter point, in case anyone misapprehends, I started putting the named problems on the MSO site, and now on the GoGoD CD. But the explanations of the names are not in the original - they come from me. I have always planned to put the rest of the problems and explanations on CD updates, because I've done all the hard work as regards the text. But I find making the diagrams too boring, and with many other things to do I haven't got round to it.

kokiri: Here are some links to the amazon.co.jp site- [ext] http://www.amazon.co.jp/exec/obidos/search-handle-form/250-6986847-3089811 to a search for the book, and [ext] http://www.amazon.co.jp/exec/obidos/ASIN/4381071417/qid=1075113174/sr=1-3/ref=sr_1_8_3/250-6986847-3089811 for one example.

If the links don't work, you can cut and paste 玄玄 碁経 into amazon.co.jp.

I've never tried ordering through amazon but there must be someone on SL who has.

I own a couple of the other books (the Igo Hatsuyoron and the Gokyoshumyo) in the same series as the book in the second link. They're nicely turned out books about half A4 or so, with an introduction by Hashimoto Utaro (IIRC), a scan of the introduction to a historic edition and a modern translation of it. They are in the format of questions on one page and the answers overleaf with 4 questions per page and a couple of diagrams for each answer.

In my opinion though, the books are more value to me for their historical interest than as practical manuals. Maybe I'm not strong enough (a lot of the problems are really hard) but I think that the layout gives the book less of an exam feel that I get with some other Tsumego books. I'm rambling a bit, but my point is really that I don't study these books the way I do some tsumego books - I'm more likely to open one up and spend a while contemplating a few problems and their solutions when I want to relax than try to drill them at all. That said, Utaro writes in one of the intros something along the lines of these problems being the ones that he and other pros have grown up with, studying again and again as children and upwards so maybe I'm just not strong enough to really gain from them. in short, if you're looking for a serious study manual, Floris, I'd see what some of the 3 dans think first.

Floris?: Don't worry, i've already been studying the online version with uligo. Except I'd rather study from a book then from my computer.

Velirun: The uligo version is all well and good, but sadly, it does not have many variations. For a work like this, the more variation the better.

Floris - if you know someone who can read Japanese, you can order from either Amazon.co.jp at the link supplied above. Alternately, you could use [ext] http://www.fujisan.com, but I don't think you can order without using the Japanese interface, sadly. I just ordered my copies of gengen gokyo and gokyo shumyo there, totalled $55 after shipping. Hope this helps!

Velirun: Or even better, you can get a four-volume Korean set for $25 US - [ext] http://www.yclwaller.com. If only I'd found this a month ago...


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