Issac Asimov and Chess

Issac Asimov and Chess

Isaac Asimov was born on January 2, 1920. In his lifetime, he wrote 470 books and is one of the greatest science fiction writers. Some of his science fiction stories mentioned chess.

One of his first science fiction stories, Nightfall, written in 1941, contains a reference to chess. A multi-chess board was set up and a six-member game was started. “The men about the table had brought out a multi-chess board and started a six member game. Moves were made rapidly and in silence. All eyes bent in furious concentration on the board.” In 1968, the Science Fiction Writers of America voted Nightfall the best science fiction short story ever written. When the book was expanded into a novel, multi-chess had been changed to stochastic chess.

His first published novel, Pebble in the Sky, published in 1950, propelled a man thousands of years into the future. The only thing that did not change, after thousands of years, was the game of chess. The novel also mentioned variants of chess such as 3-D chess, and chess played with dice.

“Chess, somehow, hadn’t changed, except for the names of the pieces. It was as he remembered it, and therefore it was always a comfort to him. At least, in this one respect, his poor memory did not play him false. Grew told him of variations of chess. There was fourhanded chess, in which each player had a board, touching each other at the corners, with a fifth board filling the hollow in the center as a common No Man’s Land. There were three-dimensional chess games in which eight transparent boards were placed one over the other and in which each piece moved in three dimensions as they formerly moved in two, and in which the number of pieces and pawns were doubled, the win coming only when a simultaneous check of both enemy kings occurred. There were even the popular varieties, in which the original position of the chessmen were decided by throws of the dice, or where certain squares conferred advantages or disadvantages to the pieces upon them, or where new pieces with strange properties were introduced. But chess itself, the original and unchangeable, was the same–and the tournament between Schwartz and Grew had completed its first fifty games. They used a “night-board,” one that glowed in the darkness in a checkered blue-and-orange glimmer. The pieces, ordinary lumpish figures of a reddish clay in the sunlight, were metamorphosed at night. Half were bathed in a creamy whiteness that lent them the look of cold and shining porcelain, and the others sparked in tiny glitters of red.”

Asimov mentioned chess in his 1950 short story, Legal Rites. “Every night we sat up together. When we didn’t play pinochle or chess or cribbage, we just sat and talked over the news of the day. I still have the book we used to keep records of the chess and pinochle games. Zeb made the entries himself, in his own handwriting.”

In 1953, in Asimov’s short story, Monkey’s Finger, he wrote, ““Yes. Yes.” Torgesson paced faster. “Then you must know that chess-playing computers have been constructed on cybernetic principles. The rules of chess moves and the object of the game are built into its circuits. Given any position on the chess board, the machine can then compute all possible moves together with their consequence and choose that one which offers the highest probability of winning the game. It can even be made to take the temperament of its opponent into account. Torgesson said, “Now imagine a similar situation in which a computing machine can be given a fragment of a literary work to which the computer can then add words from its stock of the entire vocabulary such that the greatest literary values are served. Naturally, the machine would have to be taught the significance of the various keys of a typewriter. Of course, such a computer would have to be much, much more complex than any chess player.”

In his 1953 book, Second Foundation, he wrote, “But she had died. Less than five years, all told, it had been; and after that he knew that he could live only by fighting that vague and fearful enemy that deprived him of the dignity of manhood by controlling his destiny; that made life a miserable struggle against a foreordained end; that made all the universe a hateful and deadly chess game. But there was no way of making the people suddenly disbelieve what they had believed all their lives, so that the myth eventually served a very useful purpose in Seldon’s cosmic chess game.”

In his 1955 short story, Franchise, he wrote, “We can’t let you read a newspaper, but if you’d care for a murder mystery, or if you’d like to play chess, or if there’s anything we can do for you to help pass the time, I wish you’d mention it. Reason alone wouldn’t do. What was needed was a rare type of intuition; the same faculty of mind (only much more intensified) that made a grand master at chess. A mind was needed of the sort that could see through the quadrillions of chess patterns to find the one best move, and do it in a matter of minutes.”

In his 1956 short story, The Dead Past, he wrote, “Your scientists can’t write. Why should they be expected to? They aren’t expected to be grand masters at chess or virtuosos at the violin, so why expect them to know how to put words together? Why not leave that for specialists, too?”

In his 1968 short story, Exile to Hell, he wrote, “He considered the chessboard carefully and his hand hesitated briefly over the bishop. Parkinson, at the other side of the chess board, watched the pattern of the pieces absently. Chess was, of course, the professional game of computer programmers, but, under the circumstances, he lacked enthusiasm. By rights, he felt with some annoyance, Dowling should have been even worse off; he was programming the prosecution’s case. He tapped his finger on the chessboard for emphasis, and Dowling caught the queen before it went over. “Adjusting, not moving,” he mumbled. Dowling’s eyes went from piece to piece and he continued to hesitate.”

In his 1970 short story, Waterclap, he wrote, “No mystery,” said Bergen genially. “At any given time, some fifteen of our men are asleep and perhaps fifteen more are watching films or playing chess or, if their wives are with them-”

From 1971 to 1974, Asimov wrote Tales of the Black Widowers. It had several chess references. He wrote, “He was a master at Chinese checkers, Parcheesi, backgammon, Monopoly,checkers, chess, go, three-dimensional ticktacktoe.” Do you have a chess set, Mr. Atwood?”

“Certainly!”

“Yours? Or was it a present from Mr. Sanders?”

“Oh, no, mine. A rather beautiful set that belonged to my father. Sanders and I played many a game on it.”

In 1972, in his short story, Take a Match, he wrote, “He said there was a low hum that you could hear in one of the men’s rooms that you couldn’t hear anymore. And he said there was a place in the closet of the game room where the chess sets were kept where the wall felt warm because of the fusion tube and that place was not warm now.”

In his 1976 short story, The Winnowing, he wrote, “Peter Affarre, chairman of the World Food Organization, came frequently to Rodman’s laboratories for chess and conversation.”

In 1978, Asimov wrote a story for the September 4, 1978 issue of New York Magazine, entitled, “Gosh, Kreskin, That’s Amazing!” He wrote, “The amazing Kreskin, who bills himself as the “world’s foremost mentalist,” played chess with Cleveland Amory and Jacques d’Ambroise at the Raga restaurant last Tuesday. Kreskin was blindfolded, and he announced he would call out his opponent’s moves after thay made them, presumably by reading their minds. He called out the first two moves of each opponent, then caled a halt to that part of the demonstration. Both Amory and d’Abroise made the common Pawn-to-King’s-Four opening move, and Kreskin guessed the move – after much patter and visible suffering. Kreskin moved his Queen’s Pawn up to Amory’s piece, and Amory promptly too it with his King’s Pawn. In being taken from the board, the two chess pieces made a pronounced click – a dead giveaway. Kreskin guessed the move again with suffering and delay.

For the second part of the demonstration, Kreskin had Cleveland Amory place a Knight on another chessboard with the 64 squares numbered sequentially. Although blindfolded and with his back to the chessboard, Kreskin guessed that the Knight was on No. 35. I don’t know how he did it, but I presume any good mentalist can do it. He then called off the number of 63 other squares in order, squares to which the Knight could move by legitimate Knight’s moves.

The various “Knight’s tours,” which is what these are called, are well known to chess players, and I suspect it is quite possible to memorize a Knight’s tour and then, having established the starting number, rattle off the other 63 numbers in the correct order.

Kreskin suffered through every number, though, asking for quiet, then pattering and squirming endlessly. He got the numbers right, of course.

He expressed surprise at one point that one position was followed by another square bearing a number higher than the previous one. There are 42 different positions on the squares that allow a move to another position ten higher in number by a Knight’s move, so his surprise was itself surprising.

Kreskin is offering to meet Bobby Fischer, together with the winner of the Korchnoi-Karpov match, and play them both simultaneously, himself blindfolded. If that should happen and Kreskin proceeds with constant chatter as last Tuesday, I wonder which of his two opponents will kill him first. Probably Fischer.”

In 1979, Asimov wrote Isaac Asimov’s Book of Facts. On page 68, he says, “The number of possible ways of playing just the first four moves on each side in a game of chess is 318,979,564,000.” This may be wrong. The number of possible ways for White to play the first move is 20 (16 pawn moves and 4 knight moves). For the first move with Black, the number is 400. For the 2nd move for white, the number of possible moves is 8,902 (5,362 distinct). For the 2nd move for Black, the number of possible moves is 197,281 (71,852 distinct). For the 3rd move for White, the number of possible moves is 4,865,617. For the 3rd move for Black, the number of possible moves is 119,060,679. For the 4th move for White, the number of possible moves is 3,195,913,043. For the 4th move for Black, the number of possible moves is 84,999,425,906. This is smaller than what Asimov says.

In 1981, Asimov wrote a science fiction short story called The Perfect Fit. He referred to a 3-dimensional chess game which was a game with 8 chessboards stacked upon each other, making the playing area cubic rather than square.

In 1984, in his book Bouquets of the Black Widowers, he wrote, “’Please! It will do you good to listen. You may be a distraction. If you play chess, you will know what I mean when I say you may be a sacrifice. You are sent in to confuse and distract us, occupying our time and efforts, while the real work is done elsewhere.”

In 1986, in his short story Robot Dreams, he wrote, “Paulson said, “We can’t let you read a newspaper, but if you’d care for a murder mystery, or if you’d like to play chess, or if there’s anything we can do for you to help pass the time, I wish you’d mention it.” “Reason alone wouldn’t do. What was needed was a rare type of intuition; the same faculty of mind (only

much more intensified) that made a grand master at chess. A mind was needed of the sort that could see through the quadrillions of chess patterns to find the one best move, and do it in a matter of minutes.”

In 1987, in his book Fantastic Voyage II – Destination Brain, he wrote, “In life, unlike chess, the game continues after checkmate.” There were other references to chess in the novel. He wrote, “What’s more, Aleksandr was a dreadful chess player, much to his father’s disappointment, but he showed signs of promise on the violin.” “A pawn is the most important piece on the chessboard — to a pawn.”

In 1988, in his short story The Smile of the Chipper, he wrote, “Of course, we couldn’t hire them both. Getting two chippers to work together is impossible. They’re like chess grandmasters, I suppose. Put them in the same room and they would automatically challenge each other. They would compete continually, each trying to influence and confute the other. They wouldn’t stop couldn’t actually — and they would burn each other out in six months.”

In 1990, he wrote an essay for the Los Angeles Times, entitled “Checkmate?”, about computer chess vs. human intelligence.

In his book, Isaac Asimov’s Treasury of Humor, he wrote, “Once while I was in the army, I read “The Royal Game”, surely the best chess story ever written. It filled me with a wild desire to play chess and I began to approach various soldiers who appeared the chess type. No Luck! To each one I came with a wistful “Would you like to play a game of chess?” and from each one came a cold “No.” Finally I had the idea that I should have had to start with. I came to a soldier and said, “Would you like to read a terrific story?” and handed him “The Royal Game”. I waited. An hour passed. And then he came to me and said “Would you like to play a game of chess?”

In 1994, Isaac Asimov’s last autobiography, I. Asimov: A Memoir, was published after his death. In his chapter titled Games, this is what he said about chess.

“Failure at physical sports has never bothered me…What bothered me, though, was my failure at chess. When I was quite young and had a checkerboard, but no chess pieces, I read books on the game and learned the various moves. I then cut out cardboard squares on which I drew the symbols for the various pieces, and tried to play games with myself. Eventually I managed to persuade my father to get me real chessmen. Then I taught my sister the moves and played the game with her. Both of us played very clumsily indeed.

My brother, Stanley, who watched us play, learned the moves and, eventually, asked if he might play. Ever the indulgent older brother, I said, “Sure,” and prepared to beat the pants off him. The trouble was that in the first game he ever played he beat me.

In the years that followed, I discovered that everyone beat me, regardless of race, color, or religion. I was simply the most appallingly bad chess player who ever lived, and, as time went on, I just stopped playing chess.

My failure at chess was really distressing. It seemed completely at odds with my “smartness,” but I now know (or at least have been told) that great chess players achieve their results by years and years of studying chess games, by the memorization of large numbers of complex “combinations.” They don’t see chess as a succession of moves but as a pattern. I know what that means, for I see an essay or a story as a pattern.

But these talents are different. Kasparov sees a chess game as a pattern but an essay as a mere collection of words. I see an essay as a pattern and a chess game as a mere collection of moves. So he can play chess and I can write essays and not vice versa.

That’s not enough, however. I never thought of comparing myself to grand masters of chess. What bothered me was my inability to beat anyone! The conclusion that I finally came to (right or wrong) was that I was unwilling to study the chessboard and weigh the consequences of each possible move I might make. Even people who couldn’t see complex patterns might at least penetrate two or three moves ahead, but not I. I moved entirely on impulse, if not at random, and could not make myself do anything else. That meant I would almost certainly lose.

And again – why? To me, it seems obvious. I was spoiled by my ability to understand instantly, my ability to recall instantly. I expected to see things at once and I refused to accept a situation in which that was not possible.”

Asimov died on April 6, 1992 of AIDS after a blood transfusion during heart surgery.

In 1996, in Robert MacBride’s trilogy book Caliban – Utopia, set in Isaac Asimov’s Robot/Empire/Foundation universe, the author wrote, “A whole series of questions she dared not ask flickered through her mind, along with the answers she dared not hear from Kaelor. Like a chess player who could see checkmate eight moves ahead, she knew how the questions and answers would go, almost word for word.”

In 1997, Gregory Benford wrote Foundation’s Fear as part of the Second Foundation Trilogy. It was written after Asimov’s death, authorized by the Asimov estate. There were several chess references in the book.

Occupations of Chess Players

Occupations of Chess Players

Here are some occupations of some chess masters and well-known chess players.

Accountants and chess masters include Johann Allgaier (1763-1823), Henry Bird (1830-1908), Samuel Reshevsky (1911-1992), and Frederick Yates (1834-1932). Bird also wrote a book entitled An Analysis of Railways in the United Kingdom. Reshevsky graduated from the University of Chicago in 1934 with a degree in accounting and was an accountant for a Manhattan engineering and construction firm.

Nana Alexandria (1949- ) is a Woman Grandmaster who is now an administrator for FIDE, the World Chess Federation.

Anjelina Belakovskaia is a 3-time US women’s champion who is playing in this year’s US women’s championship. She is now a professor of advanced risk management at the University of Arizona.

Chess players who knew how to fly airplanes include Ed Edmundson (1920-1982), Max Euwe (1901-1981), Harry Golombek (1911-1995), Carol Jarecki (1935- ), and Woman GM Natalia Pogonina (1985- ). Edmondson was an air Force Lieutenant Colonel and a navigator on tanker aircraft.

Pascal Charbonneau won the Canadian championship twice. He is an analyst at Alpine Associates working on Wall Street.

Samuel Boden (1826-1882) was an art critic and amateur landscape painter. He was also the chess editor of the Field from 1858 until 1873. He started as a railway clerk.

Marcel Duchamp (1887-1968) was a renowned artist and one of the founders of Dadaism, surrealism, and cubism.

Dr. Nathan Divinksy (1925- 2012) served as assistant dean of science at the University of British Columbia. His wife was the 19th Prime Minister of Canada, Kim Campbell. Divinksy received a Ph.D. in Mathematics from the University of Chicago and became a mathematics teacher. He is now an alderman on the Vancouver, BC city council.

Gosta Stoltz (1904-1963) was an automobile mechanic as well as Swedish chess grandmaster.

Elliot Winslow (1952) gave up serious chess (he was an International Master) to become a professional backgammon player and poker player. Bill Robertie is another chess player who became a professional backgammon player. Robertie graduated from Harvard and is a systems analyst. He won the 1970 US Speed Chess championship. He has won the Monte Carlo World Backgammon Championship twice. He has written books on backgammon, chess, and poker.

Sir George Thomas (1881-1972) was a professional badminton and tennis player (he once played at Wimbledon). He won the British chess championship twice and the All-England Badminton championship 7 times. In 1911, he played in the semi-finals of the men’s tennis double at Wimbledon.

Max Harmonist (1864-1907) was a ballet dancer for the Royal Ballet in Berlin, performing at the Imperial Opera House.

Bankers and chess masters include Bill Addison (1933-2008), Ossip Bernstein (1882-1962), Ignatz Kolisch (1837-1889), Ken Rogoff (1953- ), and Max Weiss (1857-1927). Addison gave up chess (he was an International Master) to work at the Bank of America in San Francisco. Addison was also considered one of the best Go players in the U.S. Bernstein was a financial lawyer and earned a doctorate in Law at Heidelberg in 1906. Kolisch started out as a private secretary of the Russian Prince Urusov, then moved to Vienna and met Albert Rothschild, who got him involved in banking. Kolisch became a millionaire from banking and later became a chess patron. Rogoff served as an economist at the International Monetary Fund and was on the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. He is currently a Professor of Economics at Harvard University. Weiss was a banker for the Rothschild bank in Vienna. He also studied mathematics and physics in Vienna and later taught those subjects.

International Master Norman Weinstein became a successful trader at a bank.

Esther Epstein (1954- ) is a Systems Manager for the Bio-Molecular Engineering Research Center (BMERC) at Boston University. She is a Woman International Master (WIM). She is married to GM Alex Ivanov.

Luke McShane is a GM and bond trader in London’s financial sector.

Larry Evans (1932-2010) was considered the best blackjack player of any Grandmaster. He was also a journalist. He wrote over 50 chess books.

Lothar Schmid (1928- ) is a book publisher. He is the owner of the largest known private chess library and a chess collector.

Boxers include Arnold Denker (1914-2005) and Max Euwe (1901-1981). Denker was a Golden Gloves boxing quarterfinalist in New York and won three Golden Gloves bouts by knockouts in the welterweight division. He was also a promising young baseball player who later got a job at a meat-packing company. Euwe was an amateur boxer and won the amateur heavyweight boxing championship of Europe.

Irina Levitina (1954- ) gave up serious chess and became a professional bridge player. In chess, she was a world championship Candidate and was a Woman Grandmaster. In contract bridge, she has been World champion four times. She ranks 2nd among World Bridge Federation Women Grand Masters in terms of master points. Alekhine was a bridge player, but not a very good one. Emanuel Lasker was also a bridge player and wrote a book on bridge.

Arthur Dake (1910-2000) was director of the Oregon Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV). He started out as a merchant seaman. He then sold insurance and telephone directories.

Amos Burn (1848-1925) was a cotton broker and sugar broker from Liverpool. He was a chess journalist and from 1913 until his death, Burn edited the chess column of The Field.

Viacheslav Ragozin (1908-1962) was a civil engineer and had a career in the construction industry.

Arnold Denker (1914-2005) was a businessman in the meat packing industry and became a millionaire.

Theo Van Scheltinga (1914-1994) worked as a carpenter at the Amsterdam Stock Exchange.

Jonathan Tisdall (1958- ) is a chef and works as a freelance journalist.

Edmar Mednis (1937-2002) was a chemical engineer, then a stock broker.

Weaver Adams (1901-1963) was a chicken farmer.

British civil servants and chess masters include Oldrich Duras (1882-1957), Wilhelm Hanstein (1811-1850), Stuart Milner-Barry (1906-1995), and Edward Sergeant (1881-1961).

Members of the clergy include Bill Lombardy (1937- ), George MacDonnell (1830-1899), Ruy Lopez (1540-1580), John Owen (1827-1901), Domenico Ponziani (1719-1796), Charles Ranken (1828-1905), Arthur Skipworth (1830-1898), and William Wayte (1829-1898).

Lombardy is a former Roman Catholic priest. Ruy Lopez was a Spanish priest and later bishop in Segura. Owen was an English vicar. Ponziani was a law professor and priest who became a canon in the Modena Cathedral, then Vicar General. Ranken was a Church of England clergyman. He and Lord Randolph Churchill (Winston Churchill’s father) founded the Oxford University Chess Club. Wayte was a Church of England clergyman.

In his earlier years, Arthur Bisguier (1929- ) was a computer programmer at IBM and gave that up to become a professional chess player.

Klaus Darga (1934- ) works as a computer programmer.

Diane Savereide (1954- ) retired from chess to become a computer programmer for NASA. She is now a software developer in Los Angeles.

Cryptographers included C.H.O’D Alexander (1909-1974), Reuben Fine (1914-1993), Harry Golombek (1911-1995), James Aitken (1908-1983), and Stuart Milner-Barry (1906-1995).

Vincenzo Castaldi (1916-1970) was a dentist in Florence, Italy. He was an Italian International Master.

George Koltanowski (1903-2000) was a diamond cutter.

Diplomats include Jose Capablanca (Cuba), Max Judd (consul-general in Vienna), James Mortimer, and Tassilo von Lasa (Prussia).

Jaroslav Sajtor worked for the diplomatic service in Czechoslovakia.

Nikola Karaklajic (1926-2008) was a disc jockey for Belgrade radio.

Louis Paulsen (1833-1891) established a distillery and was a tobacco farmer.

Elijah Williams (1809-1854) worked as a druggist.

Economists and chess masters include Igor Bondarevsky (1913-1979), Ivan Farago, Gyozo Forintos, Aivars Gipslis, Yair Kraidman, and Ken Rogoff (chief economist at the World Bank).

Electrical engineers and masters include Mikhail Botvinnik and Vladimir Liberzon. John Watson has a B.S. in Electrical Engineering. I have degrees in physics and electrical engineering and am a systems engineer.

GM Eero Book (1910-1990) of Finland was an engineer.

Former world women’s chess champion Elisaveta Bykova (1913-1989) was an engineer in a large Moscow printing house.

Donald Byrne (1930-1976) was an associate professor of English at Penn State.

Grigory Levenfish (1889-1961) was an engineer in the glass industry. He had a degree in chemical engineering.

Julio Granda-Zuniga (1967- ) is a farmer in Peru. He is a Peruvian GM.

Vivek Rao was America’s highest-rated junior player when he was 16. He is a former quantitative financial analyst on Wall Street.

Alexey Troitsky (1866-1942) was a forester in Siberia.

IM Alfred Brinckmann (1891-1967) of Germany was a functionary.

Bukhuti Gurgenidze (1933-2008) was a geologist. He was a GM from Soviet Georgia.

Victor Palciuskas (1941- ) is a former world correspondence chess champion. He was a professor of geophysics.

GM Milko Bobotsov (1931-2000) of Bulgaria was a gymnastics instructor.

Peter Thiel is a chess master and now the billionaire co-founder of PayPal who runs the hedge fund Clarium Capital.

GM Patrick Wolff, a two-time US chess champion, was an analyst at Clarium, then started his own fund, Grandmaster Capital, with $50 million under management.

Anna Hahn, the 2003 US women’s champion, became a hedge fund manager at D.E. Shaw Group.

GM Max Dlugy started his own hedge fund. He worked at Banker’s Trust on their foreign exchange spot desk. He is now manager of Diversified Property Fund.

Johann Berger (1845-1933) was an Austrian high school administrator.

Henry Buckle (1821-1862) was a British historian and writer. He wrote History of Civilization in England.

Vladimir Alatortsev (1909-1987) was a Soviet GM and hydraulics engineer.

Insurance salesmen include Al Horowitz, Issac Kashdan, Miguel Najdorf, and William Napier (vice-president of Scranton Life Insurance).

Journalists and chess masters include Manuel Aaron, Lajos Asztalos, Robert Byrne (1928-2013), Emil Diemer, Isaac Kashdan, Lubomir Kavalek, George Koltanowski, Mario Monticelli, Andy Soltis, and Boris Spassky.

Louis-Charles Mahe de La Bourdonnais (1795-1840) was a land speculator (and not a very good one at that).

Richard Teichmann (1868-1925) was a language teacher.

Lajos Asztalos (1889-1956) was a languages teacher.

Lawyers and chess masters include Gerald Abrahams, Alexander Alekhine, Rosendo Balinas (1941-1998), Curt von Bardeleben, Ossip Bernstein, Miroslav Filip, Johann Hjartarson, Paul Lipke, Paul Morphy (never practiced), Bill Martz (never practiced and became a car salesman instead), Meindert Niemeijer, Fredrik Olafsson, Julius Perlis, Harold Phillips, Domenico Ponziani, Folke Rogard, Alexander Rueb, James Sherwin (Executive VP of GAF Corporation and director at Hunter Douglas), Saviely Tartakower, Karel Treybal (judge), Mijo Udovcic, Michale Wilder (partner at McDermott Will & Emery), and Daniel Yanofsky (mayor of a suburb of Winnipeg).

James Tarjan (1952- ) gave up chess to become a librarian.

Carl Ahlhausen (1835-1892) was a librarian for the Berlin Chess Association.

Semyon Alapin (1856-1923) was a linguist, railway engineer, and grain commodities merchant.

Tim Redman is a former president of the USCF. He is a professor of literary studies at the University of Texas at Dallas.

I.S. Turover (1892-1978) founded a lumber and millwork company and became a millionaire.

Paul Keres (1916-1975) was once a professor of mathematics in Tallinn, Estonia.

Mathematicians and chess players include C.H.O’D Alexander, Adolf Anderssen, Magdy Assem, George Atwood, Christoph Bandelow, John Beasley, Otto Blathy, Hans Boumeester, Nathan Divinsky, Noam Elkies, Arpad Elo, Max Euwe, Ed Formanek, William Hartston, Paul Keres, Martin Kreuzer, Emanuel Lasker, Anatoly Lein, Lev Loshinksi, Vladimir Makogonov, Geza Maroczy, Vania Mascioni, J. Mauldon, Jonathan Mestel, Walter Morris, John Nunn, Nick Patterson, Miodrag Petkovic, Ken Regan, Hans-Peter Rehm, Ken Rogoff, and Duncan Suttles.

Mechanical engineers and chess masters include Alexander Kotov and Edward Lasker.

Medical doctors and chess masters include Jana Bellin, Fedor Bogatirchuk (also professor of radiological anatomy), Karl Burger, Ricardo Calvo, Yona Kosashvili, Ariel Mengarini (psychiatrist), Joseph Platz, Helmut Pfleger, Christine Rosenfeld, Anthony Saidy (specializing in tuberculosis), Siegbert Tarrasch, and Johannes Zukertort.

Milan Vukcevich (1937-2003) was a professor of metallurgy and Chief Engineer at General Electric. He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in chemistry.

Lev Aronin (1920-1983) was a Soviet IM and a meteorologist.

Some served in the military. C.H. O’D Alexander was a British Colonel and code breaker. Tartakower was a Lieutenant in the French Underground during World War II. Johann Allgaier was a quartermaster in the Austrian army. Jose Araiza was the Mexican Champion from 1924 to 1949 and was a Lt. Colonel in the Mexican army. Paul Rudolf von Bilguer was an Army Lieutenant. John Cochrane was a lieutenant in the British navy. Alexander Deschapelles lost his right arm fighting the Prussians. Oldrich Duras served in the Austrio-Hungarian army during World War I. Svetozar Gligoric was considered one of Yugoslavia’s best war heroes during World War II. Klaus Junge was a German Lieutenant and was shot and killed during World War II. Grigory Koshnitsky was an anti-tank gunner during World War II. George Mackenzie served as Captain in the Northern Army in the American Civil War. Gavriil Veresov was a Captain in the Russian Army. Eugene Znosko-Borovsky was wounded in the Russo-Japanese war and World War I.

Musicians and chess masters include Armand Blackmar (music professor and music publisher), Hans Johner (director of the Zurich Philharmonic Orchestra), Philidor, Mark Taimanov (concert pianist), Eileen Tranmer, and Eugene Znosko-Borovsky (music critic).

Jean Dufresne (1829-1893) was a newspaper editor in Berlin.

GM Jon Arnason (1960- ) of Iceland is Secretary and Treasurer of Oz Communications and is a successful businessman.

Painters include Samuel Boden, Marcel Duchamp, Henry Grob, Bernhard Horwitz.

Irving Chernev (1900-1981) was employed in the paper industry.

Robert Huebner (1948- ) worked as a papyrologist (an expert on Egyptian hieroglyphics)

Marmaduke Wyvill (1815-1896) was a member of parliament in England.

Alan Trefler won the World Open in 1975. He is CEO of Pegasystems.

Alexander Kevitz (1902-1981) was a pharmacist. He earned degrees in law and pharmacy. He was an American chess master.

IM George Botterill is a Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Sheffield.

Nick de Firmian (1957- ) has a degree in physics from the University of California, Berkeley.

Vladimir Malakhov (1980- ) is a Russian GM. He used to work as a nuclear physicist.

Albert Sandrin (1923-2004) was one of the world’s best blind chess players. He was also a piano tuner.

Miguel Najdorf (1910-1997) was a porcelain importer.

Josef Klinger (1946- ) gave up chess to become a professional poker player. Ken Smith (1930-1999) was a professional poker player. Walter Browne (1949- ) is a professional poker player and has won over $300,000 in poker (see picture).

GM Utut Adianto of Indonesia is a politician. In 2009, he was elected to the Indonesian Senate.

Martin From (1828-1895) was a prisoner inspector.

Reuben Fine (1914-1993), during World War II, was a translator. He gave up chess to become a psychoanalyst.

Nikolai Krogius (1930- ) was a sports psychologist. He is a Russian GM.

IM Johan Barendregt (1924-1982) of the Netherlands was a Dutch psychology professor.

GM Jacob Aagaard is an author and co-owner of Quality Chess, a chess publishing house.

Adolf Albin (1848-1920) was a publisher (he ran the Frothier Printing House in Bucharest) and translator.

Kim Commons (1951- ) was a real estate agent.

Anna Gulko is an IM and former US women’s champion. She is a research analyst at Invesco and worked at Banker’s Trust.

Henry Atkins (1872-1955), who won the British championship 9 times, was a British schoolmaster. He was a math teacher, and was then appointed principal at Huddersfield College.

Howard Staunton (1810-1874) was a Shakespeare scholar.

Seaman included Arthur Dake and William Evans (ship captain).

For a time, Grandmaster Simen Agdestein (1967- ) was also a professional soccer player. He now teaches soccer and chess at a sports gymnasium in Norway. He won seven Norwegian chess championships.

GM Duncan Suttles of Canada is a software developer and president of Magnetar Games.

IM Mario Bertok (1929-2008) of Croatia was a sports journalist.

Emil Schallopp (1843-1919) was a stenographer. He was a German player and author.

Ilya Gurevich (1972- ) became a stock exchange options trader.

Ron Henley (1956- ) became a member of the American stock exchange.

Larry Kaufman (1947- ) became a successful stock broker and trader.

GM David Norwood became a trader at Bankers Trust, but quit after a few months. He then found a job at Duncan Lawrie, a British private bank. In 2008, at the age of 40, he retired as a multi-millionaire.

John Roycroft (1929- ) was a systems engineer for IBM for 26 years.

Taxi drivers include Victor Frias, Nicolas Rossolimo, and Tim Taylor.

International Master Frank Anderson (1928-1980) graduated with a physics and mathematics degree from the University of Toronto and ran a tax consulting business.

Teachers and chess masters include Adolf Anderssen (math), Gedeon Barcza (math), Ludwig Bledow (math), Donald Byrne (English), Robert Byrne (philosophy), Arpad Elo (physics and astronomy), Max Euwe (math), Paul Keres (math), Lionel Kieseritzky (math), Danny Kopec (computer science), Geza Maroczy (math), Stuart Rachels (philosophy), Ken Regan (computer science), Ken Rogoff (economics), and Anthony Santasiere.

Vladimir Antoshin (1929-1994) was a technical designer and may have worked for the KGB.

Vlastimil Hort (1944- ) worked for a general-interest magazine as a translator.

Walter Korn (1908-1997) directed the U.N. Relief and Rehabilitation Administration after World War II, helping relocate concentration camp survivors.

Sir Philip Milner-Barry became Under-Secretary of the Treasury in England.

Geza Maroczy (1870-1951) was a waterworks engineer.

Fred Reinfeld (1910-1964) was a prolific writer. He wrote over 100 books.

– Bill Wall

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 A Mystery Wrapped in an Enigma  

On the day he won the world chess championship [August 31, 1972], Bobby Fischer posed by an Icelandic hot spring, enveloped in its vapors and a native blanket. Since then he has shrouded himself in obscurity, venturing out of seclusion only once -- in the Philippines -- to play a chess game in public. But this week attention turned again to Fischer as play began to find the man who will challenge him in 1975. In Puerto Rico, for instance, Boris Spassky reappeared for a quarterfinal match with American Robert Byrne. It seemed a fitting occasion for the priest who was Fischer's second in Reykjavik to recount that saga.

"What's with the kid? What does he want?" That is what so many people were asking in those days when Bobby Fischer was balking before and during the world chess championship in Iceland. I couldn't answer the questions then -- or even now. But there are things that happened in those hectic weeks that reveal something of the man.

There were no long-range plans for me to serve as Bobby's second in Iceland. At the time the subject came up he had already missed the opening ceremonies in Reykjavik and nearly everyone was pessimistic about the chances of his appearing at the championship. I received a message to phone Dr. Anthony Saidy, a chess friend of Bobby's and son of the co-author of Finian's Rainbow. I guessed that Fischer might be holed up with the Saidys, and he was -- he came to the telephone. I tried to convince him to go to Iceland, but he was noncommittal. "What about you? Can you come?" he asked. I told him I was committed to covering the event on cable TV. "You haven't signed anything, have you?" I had not.

That night I drove to the Saidys in Douglaston, Long Island. Tony, an international chess master, let me in and disappeared upstairs to find out if Bobby would see me. When Tony came down, I went up. Bobby and I talked for a couple of hours while a TV in the room played loudly. Bobby interrupted at one point to ask, "Do you hear a noise?" Certainly none but the TV. "Listen," he said, flicking off the set. Five yards from where we sat the gears of a digital clock were turning. The movement from minute to minute produced a click. Fischer was keenly aware of it. To me the sound was only audible with conscious effort. Bobby declared he needed a new, silent alarm clock. I told him I would get him one the following day.

The next afternoon I returned with the clock and settled down to hamburgers with the Saidys, waiting for sundown and the end of Fischer's Sabbath. He was to leave on a 9:30 p.m. plane for Reykjavik and I was hoping to see him off, but he remained in Douglaston, insisting that unless the right conditions for the match were set, he would not go. Meanwhile, in Reykjavik patient but nervous Icelandic chess officials and Dr. Max Euwe, president of the world chess organization, were agreeing to a postponement of the first game. They had too much at stake.

That Saturday night on Long Island I challenged Bobby to give me rook odds in a casual game (actually there is no casual game for Bobby). I wondered if Fischer had lost his nerve, if he feared Boris Spassky. Maybe a game would restore his confidence. At first he refused, but then he removed his queen's rook and play began. He lost the game but only after a superb demonstration of his fighting qualities in being a rook down against another grandmaster.

The next day Bobby still balked at the trip to Iceland. I decided to visit Paul Marshall, who occasionally acted as Fischer's attorney. Bobby must be gotten to Iceland at all costs. Paul phoned Fischer at the Saidy home. Bobby was watching Cade's County and would not take the call. Marshall was told to try again in an hour. When he did, Fischer took the receiver, but he might as well have continued to watch TV. Mission: Impossible seemed of considerably more interest to him than chess.

If he was to face Spassky, Fischer had to make the 9:30 p.m. flight on Monday or arrange a cable match. Monday at 2 a.m. Marshall and I set out for Douglaston. When we arrived the house appeared to be dark except for a light in the living room. We rang the bell. Believing Fischer would be awake, I looked up at the attic window. A light could be seen. Again the bell. Still no answer. We rang persistently. Fischer, who had been puttering in the kitchen, finally could not withstand his curiosity. He came to the door.

In the living room we began to talk, but Fischer was persistent. His demand-for 30% of the gate receipts-must be met. "I'm not afraid of Spassky," he said. "The world knows I'm the best. You don't need a match to prove it." Then he fell silent. Marshall prodded. Marshall urged. Fischer asked me to leave the room, and Paul continued for another half hour in fruitless debate. Finally we gave up and returned to the Marshall home in Englewood, NJ Fischer had to be smoked out. He could not be allowed to foolishly sacrifice his life's ambition. The press might help. His whereabouts would be a choice piece of information. Marshall's wife Bette volunteered to act as an anonymous caller, phoning the Daily News, The New York Times, AP, and UPI: "Hello, I'd like to tell you where Bobby Fischer is. ..." It was now 5 a.m.

Five hours later I woke to find that a British millionaire had offered Fischer 50,000 pounds if he would compete. According to Marshall the message read, "Come out, chicken, and play." Bobby considered the offer (for six hours, according to The Times) but apparently made up his mind minutes after receiving the cable. I spoke with him at 11 a.m. "Are you going to accept?" In a subdued but jubilant tone, he responded: "That's a lot of money just to give away." Being noncommittal is normal for Bobby. But he requested that chess books be ordered, books on end games, openings, of just anthologies of games. He wanted the latest Chess Life & Review. Bobby would never ask, "Are you going to be my second?" but he did ask, "Are you coming?" "You haven't asked me," I said. "Besides, I've contracted to do the match on TV."

"Somebody else can do that," Fischer said. I questioned that. "See you later," Bobby said. I decided to go to Iceland, if only to get Fischer to the playing site. I did not know how long my services would be required.

I called Leonard Barden in London that morning, asking that he ship the chess literature that Fischer had requested to Iceland. He inquired who would be paying for the material. "I presume Bobby," I replied. En route to Iceland, I told Bobby he would receive the bill. He thought the U.S. chess federation would pay for the material. Paul Marshall said he would, if Fischer would autograph the books at the conclusion of the match. Bobby agreed. Marshall is still waiting for the books, which probably are mold- ering in the cartons Bobby shipped back from Reykjavik.

An Icelandic Airlines limousine picked up the Marshalls and me, and by 5 p.m. we were at the Saidy home. It was ringed by the press and police. Marshall went into the house while I, dressed in clerical black but without the identifying white celluloid collar of a priest, proceeded to rearrange luggage in the car. A reporter asked me what branch of law enforcement I represented. I hastened into the house. There I found Marshall pacing the floor. He had just been instructed by Fischer to present me a demand. In his hand was a letter drawn up to Bobby's specifications. Fischer wanted a signed assurance that I would not discuss or write about the match in any way or annotate the games. Quite a bombshell to a friend. I agreed not to annotate the games -- Fischer could then have confidence in my discretion acting as his second -- but I agreed to nothing more and the letter went unsigned. My independence was at stake.

At last Bobby made his appearance. "Hi," he said, "is everything all right?" He peered through the window and winced at the sight of several reporters standing on the lawn in drenching rain. 'Do you think I should see them?" Someone suggested meeting the reporters in the vestibule where it was cold and damp; perhaps they wouldn't stay long. "No," said Fischer, "I'll give them one interview. I'll see them here where it is comfortable." A courteous, dignified group of men filed in. About this time an Icelandic chess master and friend of Fischer's, Freysteinn Thorbergsson, who had flown to New York hoping to convince Fischer to appear, was waiting at the Douglaston train station. Either Bobby would not see him, or was unaware of his presence. Freysteinn waited several hours and then flew back to Iceland on the same plane as Bobby, who was seated many rows to the rear. 

Previous planes had been delayed for Fischer's sake. This time Bobby was on time. The preceding week had been harrying, and the next 60 days in Reykjavik would be as tense.

Fischer had his choice of accommodations on arrival: a split-level dwelling in the suburbs that had been first prize in the national lottery, or the presidential suite in the Hotel Loftleidir. Fischer opted for the house, but he had the use of both places. Spassky had similar accommodations. It was 7 a.m. Icelandic time and at 5 p.m. that day Fischer was scheduled to meet Spassky in the opening round,

Once inside the house, Bobby announced his intention of sleeping until game time. He was told lots would be drawn for color at noon but that according to the rules a second could appear. There was no proper stationery available, only my note pad. On a three-by-five-inch sheet, Fischer com- missioned his second: "O.K. for Bill Lombardy to draw for me. Bobby Fischer." He also scribbled out a similar note for Fred Cramer, the former president of the U.S. chess federation who was acting as an aide, but on second thought decided not to sign it.

At noon I went to the Hotel Esja to await the Russians. When the group gathered, the Russians lined their side of the table with great solemnity. Spassky speaks fluent English but naturally proceeded to read his statement in Russian; an interpreter supplied a running translation. Spassky and the chess federation of the USSR had been insulted over Fischer's failure to appear at the opening ceremony; therefore, "Fischer must bear just punish- ment before there is hope of holding the match." With that the Russians tossed a copy of the statement on the table and made to go. We prevailed on them to stay but they were in no mood for discussion. "Just punishment. Just punishment," they kept saying. I knew Spassky from student-team tournaments and asked to talk with him alone. "William, this is very serious," he said, blushing furiously. "Fischer must apologize or there will be no match." I sympathized with his hurt and we shook hands. That afternoon a new round of negotiations began. The irony of the situation was that now when Bobby was itching to play, Boris was not.

Another day went by, filled with press conferences, charges and countercharges. Fischer listened to the crisis reports. The Russians wanted an apology. "Anything, anything to get the match going," he said. Marshall drew up a statement of apology. Bobby approved it but would not sign the paper. He said he wanted to make a personal explanation to Spassky. Satisfied with even minor success, Marshall and I returned to the bargaining.

Fischer's apology was refused by the Soviets, who noted it was mimeographed, sent secondhand and was unsigned. According to Marshall and Brad Darrach, a LIFE writer, Fischer was in an extremely overwrought mental state that evening. He so feared the cancellation of the match that he rather hastily drafted a letter to Boris in which he renounced all claim to the purse. Rumor has it that the original copy of this remarkable letter remains in existence in the hands of Darrach.

Marshall spent the evening convincing Fischer to curb his impetuosity. The original letter was scrapped and another handwritten apology to Boris substituted. Marshall was not satisfied with the final draft but it was simply the best he could get under the circumstances. At 5 a.m. Marshall, accompanied by Fischer, drove to the Saga Hotel. While Bobby retired to a corner of the lobby, Marshall went up to Spassky's seventh-floor suite, managed to gain entry and thrust the letter into the hands of the astonished, half-awake Russian. Whereupon Marshall fled. The apology was accepted and the match was on.

Laugardalsholl, as the chess arena was called, had been transformed into an impressive theater. The stage was thickly carpeted and the walls draped to muffle the slightest sound. Placed in the center was the massive, handmade chessboard, inlaid with Icelandic stone and Italian marble. Above was a lighting fixture that could be adjusted up to 140 candelas. In the early hours of the morning two days before the first game actually took place, Bobby made a personal inspection of the hall. He rather casually suggested that the grotesque scaffold towers, meant to house the TV cameras, be placed out of sight, maybe at the back of the hall. They were draped with burlap, punched with peepholes, and looked for all the world like Trojan siege machines. Fischer paid the matter no further heed, proceeding to test the lighting. Up to 140, down to 60, 20 and back to 100 candelas. He was satisfied with the degree of light, yet the glare had to be reduced. It was. Every celluloid filter plate in the fixture -- 98 in all -- was replaced at the cost of $600. Our lighting expert, Fred Cramer, noted that the normal light needed for reading and for playing various board games was somewhere between 24 and 40 candelas. Bobby was getting an immensely intense 120.

At the outset Fischer had been offered the hospitality of the U.S. Naval Air Station at Keflavik. He could have been the house guest of the base commander. The recreational facilities and the cafeteria of the base were at his disposal, without charge. All this changed in the days before the match. The bad press Fischer received had had its effect. House hospitality was suddenly withdrawn. Fischer had to pay for his bowling. He took no special note of the change.

On Tuesday, July 11, the first game was held. Bobby woke at 4 p.m. to what became his customary pre-game snack of skyr (a sour milk whipped with sugar and heavy cream), cheese and herring, dark bread, apple juice, orange juice, milk and dextrose malt, a barley and malt health beverage. Bobby never finished these meals. Most of the food was transported to the hall to be eaten during the game.

From the start, Bobby established a custom of tardiness. Why was he always late? His excuse was that he could only manage to wake half an hour before game time. That is possible, but there was always something else to cause delay. The food. A misplaced tie clasp. Last-minute game preparation. The right tie. Finding a good ballpoint for recording the game.

I think it was the tension, the anticipation of the chess struggle, that slowed him down. It was as if something subconscious prevented him from appearing too soon lest he arrive without full armament. It was as if an unseen force prompted him to avoid the fight until he was forced into it by the necessity of time. He wanted more than anything to play, yet before each game he had to make a superhuman effort to wind himself up. "What time is it?" he would ask. "What time is it?"

In that first game Fischer took a poisoned pawn, a reckless move that I watched with disbelief. I began to doubt my own judgment. I decided, "It's a mistake; I hope he knows what he's doing." The first game was adjourned and 10 minutes of analysis in the suite at the Loftleidir confirmed the sad truth. But Fischer and I spent another six hours considering the position. The prospect of the loss didn't seem to faze Bobby, who concluded the analysis session with, "We work well together." The next day Bobby resigned on Move 56. It took me five minutes to circle the hall to pick him up. I was greeted by Bobby snapping his fingers: "Come on, Bill; I can't wait around here all day, you know." Trouble was only beginning.

That night Argentine Grandmaster Miguel Najdorf held court in the cafeteria of the Loftleidir. "Bobby wants 30% of the gate and 30% of television, but he doesn't want the audience or the television." Najdorf roared with laughter but he had summed up the situation as most observers saw it. No one will ever know what afflicted Bobby. He could not be compelled to accept TV as a condition of play. He was concerned with money, yet would watch it drift away. He objected to noise but vetoed the soundproof glass partition that might have been erected between the players and the crowd. He wanted the feel of a live audience, but he was soon to demand play in a closed Ping-Pong room. He wanted the match, yet he seemed not to fathom or fear that it was on the verge of collapse. For him a match without perfect conditions was to be avoided.

Before the second game I went to Fischer's suite. Ready? No, he declared, if the cameras weren't out, then the game was. Referee Lothar Schmid was determined to start Fischer's clock according to the rules, ones which were drawn without consideration of that new element in chess, television cameras. It was 5 p.m., starting time, and Fischer declared he was not going; 5:10, 5:15, 5:20. 1 bounced back and forth negotiating with the film representatives. At 5:30 the camera people agreed there would be no filming during this game. Too late. The debate had cost Fischer half an hour on his clock. He wanted the time back. No, declared Lothar Schmid. Outside Bobby's hotel a squad car waited, its lights flashing, to take Fischer to the hall in time to avoid the forfeit. An hour ticked by and Fischer did not appear. Spassky was declared the winner of the game.

I decided to try a different tack. I talked to Fischer about Paul Morphy's slow start in his match with Daniel Harrwitz a century before. The first to win seven games was to be declared the winner. Morphy had begun with two losses, the same as Bobby, and this did not prevent him from garnering 5.5 of the next six games, at which point Harrwitz, pleading sickness, broke off the match. Bobby thought the matter over but said nothing.

That evening Brad Darrach and I decided to launch a telegram campaign. Calls were made to friends in the States, asking for cables of support to Bobby. Hundreds of telegrams arrived. Bobby relished each. "America waits for you to carry back the world chess championship. Don't back down now!" "The Russians want you to go home. You must play the match." These were typical messages. Perhaps this campaign caused Bobby to reshape his thinking and continue the match. Perhaps, but not before Fred Cramer had been summoned by Fischer, who demanded that plane reservations be made, destination private. Someone notified the press of Fischer's plans to leave. The press was glad to cooperate. A large contingent traveled to Keflavik to watch departing flights, while others stationed themselves around the hotel. Perhaps Bobby's fear of the press might deter him from a premature departure.

Spassky agreed to play the third game in the Ping-Pong room, though he acknowledged later it was a great psychological error. Fischer was willing to permit a remote-control, closed-circuit TV to monitor the proceedings; he never objected to remote-control cameras if they operated silently.

When Bobby arrived, Boris was, as usual, seated at the table. Bobby did not sit down but went around inspecting the television equipment, and at this point Boris betrayed indignant agitation. Bobby tested the remote-control camera for possible sources of noise. Schmid watched the proceedings and became anxious. He felt the match once more was in jeopardy. Schmid took Bobby by the arm in an effort to get him to the playing table. Bobby brushed off Schmid's entreaties. "The American grandmaster permitted himself great liberty in his remarks, which were very disagreeable to hear," Spassky said later. Finally satisfied with the camera, Bobby settled down for the match.

From the day Boris annexed the world title, his play had been less than impressive. His tournament performances through a two-year period featured a string of lackluster draws. Some viewed his no-risk policy as holding back for Fischer. Most of his peers wondered. Great grandmasters fight for victory. They are not satisfied with second, let alone sixth place, in a crucial, closely watched tournament. Each one matters. Spassky had mysteriously lost his fighting spirit long before Reykjavik. But even this cannot account for his petrifyingly passive approach to the third game. Such a stance succeeded in the first game only because of Fischer's impetuosity and his distracted play. Boris disdained every chance to pry open the third game. And, finally, he strayed from his customary habit of immediately adjourning the game upon completion of 40 moves. His 41st move was a gross blunder. 

When Bobby jumped into his Cougar for the trip home he exclaimed, "I sealed a knockout." Indeed he had. Boris appeared the next day, saw the sealed move and resigned without resuming play.

After the third session, Fischer's mood was transformed. He wanted to relax, dining in town. We drove to the Odal Restaurant where Bobby ordered a sizable meal and then abruptly left the table. He returned from a local bookstore with a wad of magazines which he devoured along with his dinner. Afterward, we walked the streets, followed for more than an hour, at a discreet distance, by two small boys. Finally, as we were leaving, they approached and asked Bobby for his autograph, which they got.

With the win, his first ever over Spassky, Fischer seemed less concerned with the second-round forfeit, but he remained adamant that no filming of future games be allowed. The Icelandic federation, for the moment, agreed. Fischer drew the fourth game and won the fifth when Spassky erred while in a grossly inferior position. By now the Russians were aware of their tactical mistake in allowing Boris to play in a closed room. They, too, began to vigorously protest game conditions, even the hum of the air conditioners.

Fischer was in high spirits the night of his second victory. After dinner we headed for the air base, Bobby driving. On a highway with a 50-mile-an-hour speed limit, Bobby drove 25. Fortunately, Icelandic traffic, particularly at one in the morning, does not pile up. Now that Bobby's chess game was superb, his bowling slackened. In 10 games he averaged only 137. I drove home. "Slow down, you're going too fast," Fischer urged whenever the speedometer ventured above 35.

Despite the victory, neither Bobby nor I was satisfied with the outcome of his king pawn sally in Game Four. "Don't worry. Sunday I will play something that will make you very happy," he promised. He was willing to change strategy, and he did. In the sixth game Fischer opened with a queen pawn for the first time in his life and Spassky retaliated with his favorite Tartakower defense. Spassky had relied on this in more than half a dozen tournament games, never losing one. But this time Boris seemed unable to cope with Fischer's surprise. He lapsed into passivity and lost. Later he reluctantly referred to the effort as "probably the best game of the match." It was a tactical and technical masterpiece and a hysterical Spassky joined the audience in applauding Fischer's win.

The seventh game was a draw, but only after Fischer missed an easy win with listless play. In the final position he was two pawns ahead, had not moved his king rook the entire length of the 49-move game and was himself forced to take a perpetual check to avoid checkmate.

A win in the eighth gave Fischer a 5-3 lead and evened his lifetime score with Boris at four wins apiece. About this time the chessboard again became a bone of contention. The workmanship, size of the squares, grain of the wood, measurement of the board itself -- one thing or another did not suit Bobby. One wonders whether the complaints weren't a ruse on his part to keep everyone occupied -- the Icelandic organizers and members of his camp. But I was aware of Bobby's professionalism and convinced that a defect in the board was distracting him.

Fischer made no public statements himself, yet when his aides attempted to explain his actions he would object. After the objection he would retreat once again into seclusion: One time he opened some mail from Buenos Aires, dumping clippings on a table. A quick look at the newspaper stories raised his ire. "You're being quoted all over," he blurted out to Fred Cramer. "No more interviews. People think you are speaking for me."

One spectator described the ninth game as "two dead men dancing." They split the point, despite a Fischer innovation. Bobby had the white pieces in the 10th game. Samuel Reshevsky once said, "Snap off the buttons and the pants fall by themselves." And this is what Fischer did. Spassky had two connected passed pawns. Fischer adroitly snapped up these by combining mating threats against Spassky's king. Bobby had his victory, and he was up by three.

By the 11th game Bobby was psychologically unfit to play safe. He wanted victories. Here was the weakness so many commentators had uncovered - an inability to pace himself in a prolonged struggle and thereby allow an opponent the opportunity to overextend himself. But then that weakness was also Fischer's strength. His uncompromising determination to see his opponent's ego collapse permitted him the risk of losing numerous battles as long as he won the war. In this game Bobby might have resigned somewhere between Moves 22 and 24. "But you can't win by resigning," the old master Tartakower once said, and Fischer plodded on to Move 31 before acknowledging his fate. Why did he not resign earlier? I think he was carried on by the momentum of the occasion. After so many victories, he found it difficult to reconcile himself to his first loss since Game One. There was a master who used to attribute his own delayed resignations to "his great love for the game."

In the 12th game the world was waiting for Fischer to avenge his loss, from which, presumably, he was smarting. Fans expected a wild affair, but the game produced hardly a flurry. There was a hint that Bobby was playing safe, and Boris was in no mood for a mishap that would increase Fischer's already commanding lead of two points. The game was adjourned with Bobby suffering no illusions as to the possible outcome, a draw. That night Bobby said if he tried too hard he could lose, although by no stretch of the imagination did he believe he could lose the adjourned position. But the comment did show he was growing wiser in the application of match strategy. He was no longer keen to plunge into his opponent's defenses on the mere chance of winning. That course had once provided weaker opponents with unmerited opportunity for victory over Fischer.

His carelessness in the 13th game, however, nearly resulted in another loss. Fortunately, he recovered. But he did not recover sufficiently. He had missed at least two winning continuations, and when the game was adjourned his expression betrayed this knowledge. That night was spent in an exhaustive session of analysis. "Do you think there's a win?" he anxiously asked. He gave the distinct impression that he knew there was no win. Fischer began furiously to shift the pieces over the board in a mad search for the win. One try, then another, produced no tangible result. He desperately wanted, needed, this win, if only to exonerate his inaccurate play during the first session. Very likely he suspected that victory was at best problematic, for at 11:45 p.m. he decided to have supper. The hotel's maitre d' had been patiently awaiting Fischer's pleasure and soon was serving up a luscious meal of salmon. Bobby had taken great pains to order large portions of everything he could think of -- soup, juices, salad, herring -- but his intense scrutiny of the adjourned position dulled any hunger pangs he might have felt earlier. He barely touched the dinner laid before him.

"What do you think of this line?" he would say, rattling off a variation. Then, without waiting for a reply, he would play a few moves beyond his suggestion and quickly reassemble the pieces at the adjourned position. Occasionally I would make a suggestion. Bobby would look and then go on alone for a while. The process was repeated constantly during the two-hour-meal." -- If the maitre d' -- entered the room with another course, at Bobby's behest the pocket sets were snapped shut. Not a word was uttered until we were alone again. At one point grandmaster Lubomir Kavalek, who was covering the match for the Voice of America, came to offer his talents in working out the adjournment. Bobby was grateful but dismissed him, saying, "a little later."

Fischer's favorite chess set sat on a dressing table flush against a wall in a corner of the room. We sat before it testing lines that offered even the remotest chance for the win. The more ephemeral became the notion of winning, the more tense Fischer became. With a start, he turned to me and asked that I move away from the board. "I'd like to look at the position alone. See what you can find on your pocket set." Intermittently he would call me back: "Take a look at this. What do you think?" Again the pieces would shuffle about the board, gaining momentum, some progress, but still no win insight.

At 3 a.m. Bobby turned suddenly and said: "Call Kavalek." The phone was at his left hand, but he seemed to fear the instrument. I protested, given the hour, but Bobby insisted, "Call him, call him." 

Kavalek picked up the receiver. "Lubosh, sorry to awaken you," I said lamely. "Bobby would like you to come to look at the adjournment." Lubosh arrived within minutes. The cycle of "Look," "No," "What do you think?" "Let me look at it alone" became a refrain. The playoff of Game 13, as on every Friday, was set for 2:30 p.m. Bobby had not tired of analysis until 8 a.m. What's more, by noon he was up struggling with that beguiling position. There were chances, but the win, he knew, was just as far away as ever.

Although Kavalek and I knew Bobby's plan of attack, Boris seemed uncomfortable when the game continued. The Russian nervously circled the table while Bobby considered this move, then that. A position was reached which many experts judged drawn. At this stage Bobby decided to go into a huddle. He stewed about 10 minutes over Move 62, another 10 over 63, and then an hour over his 64th turn! Time spent in finding the best try in a drawn position. And suddenly Bobby had won.

Watching the game's progress over the TV monitor in the lobby, the Soviet seconds were stunned by the result. Nikolai Krogius sadly admitted that Boris had erred on his 69th turn. "I didn't make enough of the fact that Fischer had consumed an entire hour over only one move," Spassky said later.

Indeed he hadn't. Boris was jittery, waiting for Bobby to move. He seemed to prefer not to reason that Bobby might be weaving a trap. More often than not, he stayed away from the table instead of bolting himself to his swivel seat and studying the position while Bobby pondered. Boris Popped in and out of the curtained entrance to the backstage. During Bobby's prolonged think, the champion, on occasion, sauntered over to the board and gazed down at the-position with a studied expression of boredom on his countenance

While Fischer dashed for his car, Spassky remained glued to his seat. A sympathetic Lothar Schmid came over, and the two shifted the pieces about with Boris demonstrating his careless mistakes. The two were left wondering how Bobby could have squeezed a win from a position which a night of competent analysis by a renowned Soviet team had showed to be a guaranteed draw.

The 14th, 15th and 16th games ended in draws. Each draw by now was as good as a full point for Bobby. With 9.5 points in his pocket, he needed only three in the remaining eight games to take the title. The match was now in the stretch. The opening repertoire of both players had been exhausted-as far as the element of surprise was concerned. The problem was how to win a won game, not just draw.

By now Fischer was becoming more and more frenetic about the noise in the hall. He instructed Cramer to write to Schmid. The letter declared, "Playing conditions Sunday at Exhibition Hall were the worst of the match to date. The audience was big, noisy, moving about, coughing, standing on all sides, whispering, even horsing around. It looks less like a chess match than like County Stadium in Milwaukee when the Braves were around. ... We must remove the first seven rows of seats. ... Persistent coughers, children running and jumping, spectators whispering, and others who con- tinue walking about should be asked to be seated quietly or to leave, not only for better playing conditions but for the benefit of those spectators who want to sit quietly and watch the exciting play. ... We have waited too long, Lothar. Let us correct these things before the match itself is jeopardized."

The Icelanders were adamant about not removing seven rows of seats. They were willing to remove two. We felt a news release stating this would be inopportune. Bobby would remain intransigent in his demands and would quit the championship if he heard of this compromise which we had quietly worked out. I hoped that when Fischer arrived for the 17th game he would not inspect the seating arrangement in the hall closely. Bobby was told that an amicable agreement had been reached; he might have been suspicious, but en route to the hall he heard over the car radio that seven rows had been removed. Thank goodness for an occasional mistake by newscasters.

New York Times Correspondent Harold Schonberg made a point of getting to the hall an hour before game time to count the seats. Seats had been an issue for so long that he apparently kept rotating charts on the number of rows moved in and out of the orchestra section of the auditorium. Harold concluded that two, not seven, rows had been removed. Fortunately, no other member of the press wanted to know Harold's count. And Schonberg himself didn't count too loudly.

The hall was dead quiet in fearful anticipation of a blowup. When Fischer emerged from backstage, he squinted out at the shadowed hall filled with spectators, sat down in his swivel seat and countered Spassky's king pawn opening.

No Fischer protest! During the course of the match, as he swayed in his executive chair, Bobby's vacant stare would engulf Boris, who seemed to be making a concentrated effort to avoid Bobby's gaze. Bobby's mannerisms must have gotten to Boris, who decided on the antidote. Boris, too, swayed-first right, then left, in a rolling motion which coupled with Bobby's lasted several minutes. It was a kind of chess rock 'n' roll. Later Fischer remarked innocently, "Yeah, I noticed he was imitating me! He's not the kind of guy who would purposely annoy you." For Bobby, this imitation might have been another clue to Spassky's deterioration, his desperation.

When the game was resumed after adjournment, Spassky moved his pieces back and forth in a threefold repetition of a position. Fischer summoned the referee to confirm what had happened and the game was declared a draw.

It was about this time that the Russians claimed electronic and chemical devices were being used to influence Spassky's play. The Soviet accusations only seemed to put Bobby in a very relaxed frame of mind. Spassky and Fischer locked in fierce

Spassky and Fischer locked in fierce combat in the l8th game. The edge shifted one way, then the other, and back again. The game was adjourned with the decision in the balance.

In an interview for 64 (No. 40, 1972), a Soviet chess publication, Spassky surveyed his play in the match in general, and in Games 18 and 20 in particular: "'Opportunities were open to me in Games 18 and 20. ... It seemed that one solitary move would be enough to reduce MY opponent. But somehow I was not capable of the effort." It is likely that Spassky psyched himself out. He has called himself "a lazy Russian bear." It takes him a long time to rev up his spirit, to get himself in good form. And possibly he no longer was by the time of the world championship.

Bobby chastised himself for his inaccurate play in Game 18. He had given Spassky too much play -- in fact, Boris might have won. On the return trip to the hotel that night Bobby whipped out the pocket chess set. In and out of the slots for the various squares flew the plastic pieces. "There may not be a win," he concluded.

Bobby waged the customarily fierce all-night analytical session, after which he realized forcing the game was too risky. He compelled the draw. Bobby: 10.5, Boris: 7.5. Any combination of victories and draws totaling two points would give Fischer the title. To retain the crown, Boris would have to score 4.5 points from the remaining six games.

When Fischer drew the 19th game the score stood at 11 to 8. The 20th game came; the 20th game was adjourned. It featured lackluster play on the part of both contestants. Boris seemed satisfied with simply attaining a respectable score. He had resigned himself to his fate. And Bobby was not one to disturb the sleeping bear. Yet throughout the match neither side would acquiesce to an easy, quick, premature draw. The result was another adjournment edge for Boris. He was continually plagued by having the advantage without being able to win. Fischer didn't enjoy being pressed. As usual, his anxiety for perfection demanded a fiercely analytical session. The draw was assured.

After the seance with Bobby, I joined his old teacher Jack Collins for coffee, but Bobby's worries apparently persisted. He telephoned me. "Are you analyzing the position with anyone?" he demanded. I pledged that all was well.

With the score 11 to 8.5, the challenger needed but two more draws or one precious victory to cinch the match. Speculation arose that Bobby, hoping to end the match, would come out slugging. But how could he hope to administer the knockout blow? He had, after all, the decided drawback of marshaling the black pieces.

As it happened, of the six Fischer wins three had been with black. The actual routing of Boris took place in Games Three and Five. Both times Fischer was black. The odds were not so long against another breakthrough in Game 21.

A very brave Boris set to work. He adopted an aggressive posture with a king pawn opening. Bobby, also in a sporting mood, retaliated with a determined Sicilian Defense, choosing a move (2. ...P-K3) he had never played before and transposing into a variation the Paulsen -- which he had never employed in serious competition. Thus, despite Spassky's determination, the element of surprise was already Bobby's with his seventh-move novelty (P-Q4).

Shaken by the tactics of a man who should have been content to grind out a draw here and in the next game, Boris consumed 50 minutes to Bobby's 20 on the first 10 moves. The sober study of the position presented no solution. He could not refute Bobby's ploy. The game was adjourned, this time with the edge firmly Bobby's.

The next day -- Sept. 1, the day Iceland proclaimed its 50-mile fishing limit -- I was drinking tea in the hotel cafeteria when someone told me it was rumored Spassky had resigned. I raced to Cramer's room where we called Lothar Schmid, who at first was unwilling to admit anything. He was afraid that if the news broke Bobby would not show at the hall. Schmid finally told us, "Bobby wins, but it is not official until he signs the scoresheet." Paul Marshall, Cramer and I marched to Bobby's third-floor suite. I knocked on the door. "Who is it?" came the voice. "Bill." The door opened a crack. "What do you want? I'm busy [analyzing the position]." "Congratulations! You're world champion!" I exclaimed. "Yeah. I heard some rumor on the radio. Is it true? Is it official?" "It's official," we said. "We spoke to Schmid."

"But that's not official," Bobby said disbelievingly. "You better go," he continued, "I've got work to do."

Marshall and Cramer left while I stayed to take a last glance at the ad- journed position. It was already 2 p.m., half an hour before game time. Bobby simultaneously ate, dressed and continued to study the position. Somehow he understood the game was really over. But he wasn't ready to admit this to anyone, even himself. "Why should Spassky resign this position?" he said. "There's a lot of play." I remember when Bobby was 11 or so how he misspelled the word "resign" on scoresheets. It was as if he never wanted to use the word. On the way to the hall Bobby sat analyzing in the front seat. I thrust a copy of My 60 Memorable Games into his hands. "What's this?" Bobby asked.

"Sign it," I urged. "I want your first autograph as world champion!"

"No, no. It's not official. Later," he replied, returning the book.

"All right," I said, "but remember, as soon as you come out of the hall, me first!"

"O.K., O.K.," said Bobby as he returned to his pocket chess set.

The car slowly edged through the crowds surrounding the hall and arrived at the players' entrance. Bobby bounced out of the car, pierced the crowds and disappeared.

Spassky did not show. Perhaps, understandably enough, he did not want to suffer the final humiliation of resigning before such a tremendous audience. He had telephoned his resignation, which was permissible under the rules, to Schmid at 12:50 p.m.

Schmid moved to the front of the Laugardalsholl stage. "Ladies and gentle- men," he said, "Mr. Spassky has resigned. This is a traditional and legal way of resignation. Mr. Fischer has won this game, Number 21, and he is the winner of the match."

Thunderous applause rang out. Bobby sat glued to his seat. Overpowering shyness forced him to look away from the audience. Schmid tried to coax him forward, taking him by the elbow. Bobby, rose, moved a step and stopped. He nodded a silent thanks to the audience and returned to the table where he apparently reviewed his and Boris' signatures on the scoresheets. Finally, he strode quickly off the stage.

On the way back to the hotel I thrust My 60 Memorable Games once more on Bobby.

"Sign!"

"I mean, Bill, what's in it for me?" he teased.

"You want to know what's in it for you?"

"Yeah, what's in it for me?" repeated Bobby.

"A big congratulations!"

At the top of the first leaf of the book Bobby put his signature, his first autograph as champion. "Should I write anything?" he asked.

"If you want, write what you feel."

Bobby wrote: "To Bill: Thanks for your help and patience."

Bobby should be champion of world for a long time to come. He is a genuine world champion. Now the only question is: Will he ever again play another match?

by William Lombardy
Sports Illustrated - January 21, 1974