![[Welcome to Sensei's Library!]](images/stone-hello.png "Sensei's Library")
Recently I purchased a small book (booklet actually) with a very long title. In part it reads, "Go Openings: Fuseki, Joseki, Go Opening Theory, Chinese Opening..." The very first chapter of the book states in part, beginning at paragraph two, "It is distinguished by rapid development on the side, rather than making a corner enclosure. It has a fairly long history, but the Chinese player Chen Zude pioneered it in top-level play." (3rd Paragraph) "The Chinese style became very popular in Japan about 1970 onwards, and has by Go standards, a thoroughly-researched theory."
sounds great - but where can one go to read about this research? In other words, how can an average Go player ascertain why the Chinese opening is better or worse than a typical, "go for the corner" opening? Is the "High" Chinese opening better or worse than the "Low" Chinese opening, and why? How do we research these things to both learn more about the game we love, and hopefully improve?
Uberdude: You can read a lot about the Chinese opening here on SL, see the parent page ChineseFuseki. That also has may links to external resources such Charles Matthews' series of articles on Gobase. Also there is an entire book by Kato Maso on the Chinese opening.
The Chinese opening is nethier better or worse than making a shimari, both are good moves that have been played for decades and remain popular in pro play today. Likewise the high and low are both good and one cannot say one is better than the other: the high is more influence oriented and the low more for territory; it's just a matter of preference (the low is more popular). Read about them in various sources and try them out in your games to learn about them.
There's a book about it by Kato Masao: TheChineseOpening. Also ADictionaryOfModernFusekiTheKoreanStyle has some good information. I'd also recommend just playing through pro games to see how it's played.