Why You Lose at Bridge
| Author | S. J. Simon |
|---|---|
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Subject | Contract bridge |
| Published | 1945 |
| Publisher | Nicholson & Watson |
| Pages | iv + 154 |
| OCLC | 18352804 |
| Author | S. J. Simon |
|---|---|
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Subject | Contract bridge |
| Published | 1950 |
| Publisher | Nicholson & Watson |
| Pages | iv + 128 |
| OCLC | 13548585 |
Why You Lose at Bridge is a book about the game of contract bridge by the Russian-born English bridge player S. J. "Skid" Simon (1904–48), first published in 1945. It contains practical advice directed mainly towards rubber bridge players, and introduces to the world four stereotypical bad players: Mr Smug, the Unlucky Expert, Mrs Guggenheim, and Futile Willie. It has been much admired by duplicate bridge players as well as by rubber bridge players, and Simon's fictional characters have passed into legend.
Cut for Partners, another book by Simon, recounts the further misadventures of his four fictional players. It was published posthumously in 1950.
Simon dedicated the book to the memory of Richard Lederer, his friend and fellow bridge expert. "Portrait" (Simon's title for his preface to his book) exemplifies his style of writing:
You are the ordinary club player.
You have a fair amount of playing ability, which you imagine is greater than it is. A smattering of all the more popular systems. And a pet system of your own (probably a variation of the "Two Club") which you play whenever you manage to cut one of your favourite partners.
Your bidding is adequate and your defence quite shocking.
You have no ambition to become a master player, but you like winning.
You do not keep accounts and tell everybody that you think you are about all square on the year.
You lie - and you know it.
According to Simon, the two primary reasons for losing at bridge are (a) lack of technical skill and (b) losing tactics. Simon claims to address the latter alone, but that is not entirely true: for example, Chapters II and III include sound technical advice on cardplay.
The book consists of 12 chapters: I "The Points You Lose 'Ignoring the Odds'", II "The Points You Lose Playing the Dummy", III "The Points You Lose in Defence", IV "The Points You Lose 'Bidding'", V "The Points You Lose NOT Doubling", VI "Your Battlefield", VII "Don't Teach Your Partner", VIII "Half a Loaf", IX "They Can't Fool Me!", X "Fixed - By Palookas!", XI "The Logic of Luck", and XII "A Rubber at the Club".
Chapters I-IV relate mainly to technical aspects of bidding and play. They include some of Simon's better-known aphorisms
Chapter V discusses the penalty double; whose theory is, according to Simon, the least understood theory in Contract Bridge.
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