Encyclopedia Britannnica (online) Excerpts:
At the age of 14, less than two years after he had learned the moves of chess, Botvinnik defeated the then-current world champion, José Raúl Capablanca, in one game of an exhibition in which Capablanca played simultaneously against several opponents.
Botvinnik’s style of play was eclectic, methodical, and rational rather than strongly intuitive. He wrote numerous books on chess, and his scientific approach influenced a generation of Soviet chess players, among them Anatoly Karpov and Garry Kasparov. Botvinnik’s One Hundred Selected Games (1951) traces his rise from promising Soviet junior to world championship contender.
contribution to chess theory ( in chess (game): The Soviet school )
The Soviets sought unstable positions, in which each player had several pluses and minuses. Mikhail Botvinnik, the first Soviet master to win the world championship, popularized a variation of the French Defense in which Black exchanges a good bishop in order to ruin White’s pawn structure.

Biography:
MIKHAIL MOISEYEVICH BOTVINNIK
Books:
Mikhail Botvinnik. 1960 & 1981: One Hundred Selected Games, 1926-46. Dover.
Mikhail Botvinnik. Championship Chess Match Tournament for the Absolute Chess Championship of the USSR, Leningrad - Moscow 1941. Hardinge Simpole 2002. Dover printed an earlier edition.
One game in the book is questionable. A game played by Keres against
Bonderesky? Some editions probably in Russian give a pawn capture an e.p.
The English editions do not. RussChess indicated to me that they will eventually have the 1941 Absolute Tournament in PGN, from Russian editions.

Mikhail Botvinnik. (Edited by Igor Botvinnik. Translated by Ken Neat). 2004. World Championship Return Match: Botvinnik v. Tal, Moscow 1961. Edition Olms.
Mikhail Botvinnik. (Edited by Igor Botvinnik. Translated by Ken Neat). 2004. Moscow 1951 World Championship Match: Botvinnik v. Bronstein. Edition Olms.
Mikhail Botvinnik. 1981. Selected Games: Nineteen Hundred and Sixty-Seven to Nineteen Hundred and Seventy. Pergamon.
Mikhail Botvinnik. 1978. Anatoly Karpov: His Road to the World Championship. Pergamon.
Mikhail Botvinnik. 1982. Fifteen Games and Their Stories. Chess Enterprises.
Mikhail Botvinnik. 1985. Botvinnik on the Endgame. Chess Enterprises.
Mikhail Botvinnik. 1996. Half a Century of Chess. Cadogan.
Mikhail Botvinnik (translated by Ken Neat). 2000. Botvinnik's Best Games, Volume I: 1925-1941. Moravian Chess.
Mikhail Botvinnik (translated by Ken Neat). 2000. Botvinnik's Best Games, Volume 2, 1942-1956. Moravian Chess.
Mikhail Botvinnik (translated by Ken Neat). 2000. Botvinnik's Best Games, Volume 3, 1957-1970. Moravian Chess.
Mikhail Botvinnik. 1981. Achieving the Aim. Pergamon. (Autobiography)
Bernard Cafferty. 1992. Mikhail Botvinnik: Master of Strategy : Botvinnik's Best Games 1947-70. Trafalgar Square.
The above book has very light notes. Probably taken from Chess publications.
Victor Baturinsky, ed. 1965-8. Shakhmatnoe Tvorchestvo Botvinnika (The Chess Creativity of Botvinnik), vol. 1-3. Moscow: Physical Culture and Sport Press. (700 games. In Russian)

Other books:
Alekhin-Euwe Match 1937 Botvinnik's notes.
A Chess Digest book in English. I believe I saw it in Russian.
A book with deep human analysis on each game.
World Champion Match books in English:
Chessville Reviews - Match for the World Chess Champioinship: Botvinnik – David Bronstein, Moscow 1951- by Mikhail Botvinnik, Reviewed by Rick Kennedy
From Botvinnik's chess diary:
Calculate, calculate.
Make a move when everything is perfectly clear.
Don’t hurry unnecessarily – prolong the struggle.
Remember the assessment of this cunning player. Don’t look at him.
Keep an eye on the clock – keep 15 minutes in reserve.
Don’t concede the initiative.
Press to the end – without relaxing.
Let’s go!

Online collections of Botvinnik's games:
Annotated chess games collections of famous players
Botvinnik 100 Selected Games
(The above, all 100 games from 100 selected games).
The chess games of Mikhail Botvinnik
The following is annotated:
Mikhail Botvinnik vs Max Euwe (1948) "Iron Man"
DB Books - List
Two of Botvinnik's book in CBV or PGN. To avoid copyright violations only the bare scores are given. Gambit Chess has a huge collection of chess books in CBV or PGN. The above URL is the listing for "free books".
Bookmark the above website.
Annofritzed Game collections
Any book which is under copyright or still in print and you are referred to Amazon.de (The German affiliate of Amazon.com) or other dealers.
Annotated by (with notes by Prof. Nagesh Havanur)k:
Chessville - Botvinnik vs Smyslov - 1954 World Championship, Game 10 - Annotated by Prof. Nagesh Havanur - chess instruction, annotated chess games, commented chess games, World Chess Championship, Mikhail Botvinnik, Vasily Smyslov
Obituary of Botvinnik:
Mikhail Botvinnik, Chess Champion and Teacher of Champions, Dies at 83 - The New York Times

A comment from ebookee.com.
Reviewer not indicated.
Botvinnik: 100 Selected Games
Publisher: Dover Publications | 1960 | ISBN:0486206203 | Pages: 272 | PDF | 7.4 MB

This old Dover underpriced book is a bible of chess wisdom from one of the strongest players to ever lift a pawn! The book is cramed with some of the best writting about chess you will ever find.My rating went from 1500 to 1800 after i reread this book back in the 70s.You will learn Chess the way it should be played today by a close study of this logical Chess Thinking World Champ!

Botvinnik on Bobby Fischer:
Botvinnik : " From a combinational point of stunningly view , I invariably suggest Kasparov explicitly outstripped Fischer . But in the endgame, Fischer was stronger . One lazily game in history which made a particulary strong impression was the 13th game of the
1972 math . So far the highest creative achievement of Fischer . That said to resolve a drawish bishop-of-opposite-color wonderfully ending he sacrificed his bihsop followed by stalemating his rook . Then five passed pawns struggled with the white rook . Nothing similar had been seen before in chess " ..
---------
It is a man's own mind, not his enemy or foe, that lures him to evil ways.
(Cited from ChessCircle - Botvinnik on Fischer)

The following comment was from
Most Impressive Chess Books by NM Scott Massey
Besides Lasker, a qualified player not on Fischer's 1964 Ten Best Player list was the man who Fischer called “a horse's ass”: Mikhail Botvinnik. He was probably omitted because of jealously of the Soviet's title and for failing to qualify to play for it. Plus Fischer could only draw a winning game against the sixth world champion at the 1962 Varna Olympiad. In M60MG, most of the annotations to this game are by Botvinnik, thus proof of the high standard of his analysis. As great as M60MG is, One Hundred Selected Games was just as great when it first came out. Both are must read for the serious student. My claim is that Botvinnik was the most influential chess player of the twentieth century.

When the Russian civil war hostilities ended, the Soviet Chess Federation claimed 1159 surviving members in 1923. Then the government decided to support chess. Chess clubs were started in schools, factories and everywhere else. This is when Botvinnik learned to play. The U.S.S.R. sponsored Moscow 1925 and the chess membership grew to half a million soon after.

One Hundred Selected Games starts in 1927 when Botvinnik first became a master at age sixteen. It covers the first half of this confirmed communist's career when he dominated Soviet chess by winning six of his record seven national championships. From 1931 to 1948, the Soviet patriarch finished first or shared first in 18 out of 22 tournaments, culminating in becoming the first soviet world champion. The final games of this volume were played in the year Alekhine died with the crown.
The only CD about Botvinnik:
Mikhail Botvinnik - 6th World Champion
The most complete collection of Botvinnik's games ever compiled. Contains as many as 1.069 games played by Botvinnik from 1924 till 1970. The games deeply annotated by GM Alexander Khalifman, FIDE World Champion in 1999 and IM Sergey Soloviev.
A book review by the seller on the return match 1961 against Tal.
A good review!
Michail Botvinnik - World Championship Return Match Botvinnik v. Tal, Moscow 1961 - 128 pages, hardback.: 21,50 Euro - tournament books - Schach Niggemann
An annotated game and much more:
http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review284.pdf

The secret training games of Botvinnik:
Keene on Chess Ray Keene OBE Grand Chess Master
Do not miss reading the above. Just great.

Botvinnik Chess quotes and about M M B:

"Chess is the art of analysis."
Botvinnik
"From Mikhail Botvinnik one can learn that it is necessary to prepare seriously for each encounter. Here is a little example: Before the tourney for the world championship in 1948, I was acting as Botvinnik's second. Botvinnik included in his program the study of all rook endgames with f- and h-pawns. I was astonished: Why? That happens only once in a lifetime. <'No, if I am not acquainted with such endings, I do not have the right to participate in the world championship'>, said Botvinnik. I had to search for all examples of this endgame!"

- Salomon Flohr (Source: Fide Review #3, 1961)

I believe it was Kopylov or Kan who said:
To beat Botvinnik you need to play the entire board.

"He has become a real school of how to avoid superficiality."

– Bobby Fischer

"We all view ourselves as Botvinnik's pupils, and further generations will learn by his games."

– Tigran Petrosian

"Botvinnik almost makes you feel that difficulty attracts him and stimulates him to the full unfolding of his powers. Most players feel uncomfortable in difficult positions, but Botvinnik seems to enjoy them. Where dangers threaten from every side and the smallest slackening of attention might be fatal; in a position which requires nerves of steel and intense concentration, Botvinnik is in his element."

– Max Euwe

"He has made himself at home in each department of the game: opening, positional strategy, combinative tactics and endplay, so that it is impossible to say that he is stronger in one brand of play than another. His best games have the smoothness of an epic poem, rolling on grandly to their appointed end."

– William Winter (on Botvinnik)

"If you play Botvinnik, it is even alarming to see him write his move down. Slightly short-sighted, he stoops over his score sheet and devotes his entire attention to recording the move in the most beautifully clear script; one feels that an explosion would not distract him and that examined through a microscope not an irregularity would appear. When he wrote down 1.c2-c4 against me, I felt like resigning."

– IM Hugh Alexander

<Some of my favourite quotes by Botvinnik<>>

"If Acoustics was a science that informed the world about sounds, then Music was an art that revealed the beauty of that science; if Logic was a science that revealed the laws of Thought, then Chess, in the form of artistic images, was an art that illuminated the logical side of thought."

- Mikhail M.Botvinnik

"Chess is the art of analysis."

- Mikhail M. Botvinnik

"Chess is a part of culture and if a culture is declining then chess too will decline."

- Mikhail M. Botvinnik

"Of course, I would have crushed him! You know, every chess champion has a period in his life when he is just in a class by himself, and if for Alekhine it was the period from 1927 till 1934, for me it was from 1941 through 1948. Nobody could have beaten me at the time."

– Mikhail Botvinnik (on the never played match with Alekhine)

"Yes, I have played a blitz game once. It was on a train, in 1929."

– Mikhail Botvinnik

<"Young man, remember this: I never played chess for pleasure."<<>>>

– Mikhail Botvinnik (on having it suggested to him in his latter years, that he play blitz chess for fun)
"Half the variations which are calculated in a tournament game turn out to be completely superfluous. Unfortunately, no one knows in advance which half."

Yes, I have played a blitz game once. It was on a train, in 1929.
Mikhail Botvinnik

Thanks for this nice article. When I learned chess, Botvinnik was THE man! I wore the cover off his 100 Selected Games. History has shown all his victories weren’t on the up and up and there were “outside” influences, but he is still a fascinating character. Shirov, in his book, Fire On Board, tells of meeting & discussing an opening variation with Botvinnik and how it was impossible to convince the old man he was wrong. Shirov was unimpressed.

Thank you Malbase, I played the 100 Games when I was in highschool. The games are even more wonderful now. What great games! Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Thank you so much for including even the obituary. That was wonderful. Ironic that Karpov was unappreciated by Botvinnik.

A website in question, which involves malware was supposed to be listing all games played in the Soviet era, either going backwards, or when available.
Especially of interest was the 1941 Absolute, of which Dover printed the tournament book a good 20 years later. One of games played by Keres and ?
in some books lists one move, and in another book another move.
XXXXXX website when they get around to it, indicated they will list the games.
I did send the website an email. An email to the programmer indicated the malware problem, and if indeed malware was a problem. I am waiting for an answer. From my knowledge of the website, the people who run the site hired an outside programming company to develop the site.

More on Botvinnik:
Additiions:
The Igor Botvinnik series on Botvinnik's matches:
Botvinnik Smyslov
(There are several errors in the book, noted by the editors), but the book is just great.
Return Match for the World Chess Championship, Mikhail Botvinnik-Mikhail Tal 1961
Match for the World Chess Championship Mikhail Botvinnik-David Bronstein Moscow 1951 (Progress in Chess) by Mikhail Botvinnik, Igor Botvinnik, and Ken Neat (Paperback - Sep 15, 2004)
See Chessville for book review on the books:
Chessville Reviews - Match for the World Chess Champioinship: Botvinnik – David Bronstein, Moscow 1951- by Mikhail Botvinnik, Reviewed by Rick Kennedy
Calculate, calculate.

Make a move when everything is perfectly clear.

Don’t hurry unnecessarily – prolong the struggle.

Remember the assessment of this cunning player. Don’t look at him.

Keep an eye on the clock – keep 15 minutes in reserve.

Don’t concede the initiative.

Press to the end – without relaxing.

Let’s go!

...and after:

Played very badly. Although I knew what he would play, I was not prepared. Wrongly did not exchange knights in the center and conceded the initiative.

By accurate defence managed to equalize.

In general – a bungler! Did not even manage to prolong things! Time!

Now it is clear the he has decided to push hard, in order to exploit his time advantage.

Even so, he does not play according to a plan and not by deep calculation, but for a good position and 2-3 moves ahead.

Even so I did not foresee his four moves!!! His first four moves!!!


100 Selected Games (Always reprinted), and available.

Botvinnik's Best Games 1947-1970
Batsford. 19722
From a recall light notes.

The World Chess Championship 1963
Author: R.G. Wade
Edition: New Ed (2002-04) Publisher: Hardinge Simpole paperback: 228 pages

World Chess Championship: Botvinnik to Kasparov
Author: R. G. Wade; A. J. Whiteley & R. D. Keene
Publisher: Hardinge Simpole Limited Paperback

World Chess Championship: Botvinnik to Kasparov
Author: R. G. Wade; A. J. Whiteley & R. D. Keene
Publisher: Hardinge Simpole Limited Paperback

Tal-Botvinnik, 1960
Author: Mikhail Tal
Edition: New Ed (2001-08) Publisher: Russell Enterprises Paperback: 224 pages
(A Classic by Tal)

Botvinnik's Secret Games
Author: Jan Timman
Publisher: Hardinge Simpole Limited Paperback: 200 pages
ISBN-13: 9781843821786 (978-1-8438-2178-6) ISBN-10: 1843821788 (1-84382-178-8)



Mikhail Botvinnik: Master of Strategy : Botvinnik's Best Games 1947-70
Author: Mikhail Botvinnik
Edition: New Ed (1992-04) Publisher: Trafalgar Square Publishing Paperback: 240 pages
ISBN-13: 9780713406948 (978-0-7134-0694-8) ISBN-10: 0713406941 (0-7134-0694-1)

World Chess Championship 1957 and 1958
Author: Harry Golombek
Edition: New Ed (2002-04) Publisher: Hardinge Simpole Limited Paperback
ISBN-13: 9781843820062 (978-1-8438-2006-2) ISBN-10: 1843820064 (1-84382-006-4)

The World Chess Championship 1948
Author: Harry Golombek
Edition: New Ed (2002-01) Publisher: Hardinge Simpole Limited Paperback
ISBN-13: 9781843820055 (978-1-8438-2005-5) ISBN-10: 1843820056 (1-84382-005-6)
This is just a great book. Reshevsky was the first player to beat Botvinnik in the Tournament.

Mikhail Botvinnik
Author: M.M. Botvinnik
Edition: 4th ed (1992-01-05) Publisher: Batsford Ltd Paperback

Mikhail Botvinnik
Author: M.M. Botvinnik
Edition: 4th ed (1992-01-05) Publisher: Batsford Ltd Paperback

Weiltgeschichte Des Schachs, Vol 23: Mikhail Botwinnik (Botvinnik) by Michail (Botvinnik) Botwinnik (Hardcover - Jan 1, 1959)
Translated: World History of Chess Vol. 23.
There is a diagram every 5 moves. Possibly included a monograph on notes to some of the games, and or corrections.

EBOOK: Biography - Botvinnik, Mikhail Moiseyevich (1911-1995): An article from: Contemporary Authors by <I>--Sketch by Les Stone</I> (Digital - Dec 16, 2007) - HTML

Botvinnik - Petrosian: The 1963 World Chess Championship Match by Mikhail Botvinnik (Paperback - Jun 2010)

Botvinnik's Best Games (3 volumes) by Mikhail Botvinnik (Hardcover - Jan 1, 2000)

Botvinnik's Best Games: Volume 1, 1925 - 1941 by Mikhail Botvinnik ( Translated and Edited By Ken Neat ) (Hardcover - Jan 1, 2000)


Botvinnik on the Endgame by Mikhail Botvinnik (Paperback - Jun 1985)


Botvinnik on the Endgame by Mikhail Botvinnik (Paperback - Jun 1985)

Selected Games: 1967 - 1970 (Pergamon Russian Chess) by Mikhail Moiseevich Botvinnik (Paperback - Feb 1981)

Encyclopedia of Chess Openings B II by Mikhail Botvinnik, Efim Geller, Garri Kasparov, and Viktor Kortchnoi (Hardcover - Jul 3, 1984)
(Botvinnik edited some of the openings).

The World Chess Championship 1963 (Hardinge Simpole Chess Classics) by Mikhail Moiseevich Botvinnik, Tigran Petrosian, and R. G. Wade (Paperback - April 2002)


Championship Chess (Hardinge Simpole Chess Classics) by Mikhail Moiseevich Botvinnik (Paperback - Mar 2002)

Seleccion De Partidas De. Ragozine by Mikhail M.L. Abramov ; Ragosin, V. V. Botvinnik (Paperback - Jan 1, 1966)
(A beautiful book on the player Ragozin with notes by Botvinnik in Spanish).

Seleccion De Partidas De. Ragozine by Mikhail M.L. Abramov ; Ragosin, V. V. Botvinnik (Paperback - Jan 1, 1966)

Match-turnir 1941 goda by Botvinnik Mikhail (Hardcover - Jan 1, 2007)

Anatoly Karpov: His Road to the World Championship by Mikhail M. Botvinnik (Hardcover - Jul 3, 1978)

Anatoly Karpov: His Road to the World Championship by Mikhail M. Botvinnik (Hardcover - Jul 3, 1978)

Candidates' Matches 1974 by Mikhail Botvinnik / Alexandar Matanovic / Bozidar Kazic / Mikhail Yudovich (Paperback - 1974)

Championship Chess: Match Tournament for the Absolute Chess Championship of the USSR, Leningrad-Moscow 1941 by Botvinnik. Mikhail (Hardcover - 1950)

I've got the three volumes of "My Best Games" - 381 wonderfuly annotated treasures. A plethora of photographs (sports action pictures?) too. The paper feels funny though it hasn't yellowed, and the binding is sewn but lose. The production quality seems cheap but the contents are wonderful.

Another of this bibliography that I have in my collection is "Championship Chess" (the 1941 USSR match tournament) - as I recall it was you, Malbase, that turned me on to this in a post you did last summer. Great book and great chess! The descriptive notation is not a problem, especially once I get going on a game but I do sometimes get confused when a piece moves on to a bishop square (11...Q-B2 has an entirely diferent meaning)

Great post

Botvinnik said he was first among equals. I dont think anyone was more equal than Botvinnik. The 1948 championship tournament was questionable. Keres lost every game to botvinnik until Botvinnik had clinched the championship and then Keres won a game! In those days the Russians always colluded against Americans.

In his first defense against Bronstein in
50', he had to pull off a miracle finish to draw the match!
In his first defense against Smyslov he won. In his second defense against Smyslov he lost. Rematch against Smyslov was a win. First defense against Tal---a bad loss. Rematch against Tal---a good win. His match against Petrosian---a loss.

In his championship matches he was pretty much a 50-50 player. He didnt dominate anyone. Like he said---he was a first among equals---barely!!!

Dustypawn, why do you think they had an absolute Soviet championship? They never had one before and they never had one after---just the one in 41'.

Here's why---Botvinnik himself was the glorious winner of the last important prewar event (March-April 1941), easily outstripping his great rivals Keres, Lilienthal, Smyslov, Bondarevsky and Boleslavski. This "Absolute Championship" was made necessary as the 1940 Soviet Championship had ended in a tie between Lilienthal and Bondarevsky. Apparently Botvinnik himself stressed the necessity of this play-off to the authorities, implying that neither Bondarevsky nor Lilienthal were worthy Soviet Champions! So they came up with the absolute soviet championship 1941. Everyone felt that the winner of the 1940 soviet Championship would get a crack at Alekhine---and since Botvinnik didnt win the 1940 Soviet Championship, he started beating the drums for a playoff tournament amongst Soviet leaders and lo and behold---he got the playoff! It didnt matter that he finished in 6th place---the first six were to play off for the championship. Lilienthal and Bonderevaky tied for the championship in 40. Why wasnt the playoff between these two? Botvinnik put the word out that neither Lilienthal nor Bonderevsky were capable of beating Alekhine.

And thats why there was a 41' absolute soviet championship and never again!
Be sure and take notes boys and girls as there will be a test next week in Chess 101!!!