Stanford-bound Parimarjan Negi launches book

NEW DELHI: India's youngest Grandmaster Parimarjan Negi, who unveiled his first book on chess on Friday, said he had no plans to give up the game completely while pursuing higher studies.
The 21-year-old is now pursuing an undergraduate programme at Stanford University and won't be very active in the circuit. "It's not exactly a break from chess," he said. "I will probably play a tournament a month but it's not a necessity.I have to see how financially viable it is since I do not have sponsors. I think I will still be playing quite often so I hope to keep increasing my rating.
"This will be for at least four years... when I will be balancing my studies and chess, and then I might have to reassess the situation. However, I have no plans to give up chess completely," he said.
On his book, 'Grandmaster Repertoire — 1e4 vs The French, Caro-Bar and Philidor', Negi told TOI, "This is my first book. I plan to write four more after this. It is basically meant for chess players as it involves a lot of technical details. You need to be serious about improving yourself so I hope it helps with that."
Talking about last month's Chess Olympiad in Tromso, Norway, where India won a bronze medal thanks to his stellar effort, he said, "It was my final tournament before my college so till that time, my complete focus was on chess. There were no studies involved. It was a great way to end that period of my life. It was sort of a high but I hope it won't be the high point of my career and hopefully, I will continue to grow."