10989. Possible
Fischer events
An article by Frank Draper on page 11 of the Evening
Standard, 8 March 1973:
10990.
Juniors
From our file of Evening Standard cuttings we
present a montage of some articles by Leonard Barden:
The players are Neil Carr (4 January 1977), Julian
Hodgson (11 May 1974), Simone Leberman (7 January 1974),
David Norwood (1 August 1977), Nigel Short (28 December
1977, 30 December 1977 and 3 January 1978) and Jonathan
Speelman (12 December 1972).
10991.
Capablanca in 1909
A better version of the illustration in C.N. 3742 from
page 12 of the Topeka Daily State Journal, 7
December 1909:
10992. Resignation
After 31 Be2, was Black justified in resigning?
10993.
‘Book of the Year’
The English Chess Federation’s webpage ‘Book
of the Year 2018 shortlist’ miscopies one title,
transforming Karjakin into ‘Kajarkin’. (A panel member’s
personal
webpage goes further, with ‘Kajarkan’.) Nothing is
disclosed about the contest’s conditions, such as
eligibility in terms of date of publication, or about
the three judges’ imagined credentials. The inclusion of
S. Tkachenko’s book on Alekhine indicates that proper
historical standards are not a requirement.
10994.
Chess and war
A sketch on page 297 of the Illustrated London News,
9 March 1940:
Larger
version
The picture was reproduced on page 161 of CHESS,
April 1940.
10995. Hans
Müller
Which are the best sources for information about Hans
Müller, including his non-chess activities? A paragraph
from page 992 of L’Echiquier, March-April 1935:
‘Ce qui est curieux dans le cas de Hans Müller (né
en 1896), c’est qu’il est en même temps maître
d’escrime, de skis et de lawn-tennis et qu’il a, en
outre, publié des travaux intéressants sur la
graphologie, la microscopie et sur la philosophie
hindoue.’
Below is an autobiographical note on pages 121-122 of Deutsche
Schachblätter, 15 April 1938:
A portrait of Müller on page 122:
10996.
The Wallace murder case
There is a reference to the Wallace murder case in Evil
Under the Sun by Agatha
Christie (first published in 1941). The passage,
at the start of chapter five part five, is shown below
from page 71 of a Christie anthology published by
Hamlyn, London in 1970. The two police officers and
Hercule Poirot have just questioned Kenneth Marshall,
the murder victim’s husband:
An on-line search reveals a mention of Wallace in
Agatha Christie’s posthumous novel featuring Miss
Marple, Sleeping Murder:
‘And Wallace, a quiet man whom the jury insisted did
kill his wife, though the sentence was quashed on
appeal.’
10997
Resignation (C.N. 10992)
After 31 Be2 Black resigned on the grounds that a
decisive march by the white king to b8 is unpreventable.
The game, played by correspondence in Berlin between
the Café Kaiserhof and the Café Royal, was published on
pages 50-51 of the February 1899 Deutsche
Schachzeitung:
1 e4 e5 2 Nf3 Nc6 3 Nc3 Nf6 4 Bb5 Bc5 5 O-O O-O 6 Nxe5
Bd4 7 Nf3 Bxc3 8 dxc3 Nxe4 9 Re1 f5 10 Bc4+ Kh8 11 Bd5
d6 12 Nd4 Nxd4 13 cxd4 Nf6 14 Bg5 h6 15 Bxf6 Qxf6 16 Qe2
c6 17 Bb3 Bd7 18 Qe7 Rad8 19 Qxf6 Rxf6 20 f4 Rff8 21 Re7
Bc8 22 Rae1 d5 23 Rc7 Rd7 24 Re7 Rxc7 25 Rxc7 Rd8 26 h4
h5 27 c3 Kh7 28 Bd1 Kg6 29 b4 a6 30 Kf2 Re8 31 Be2
Resigns.
From page 13 of Schachjahrbuch für 1899. II. Theil
by Ludwig Bachmann (Ansbach, 1900):
Richard Forster (Zurich) writes:
‘The best line may be 31...Rh8 32 Bf3 Kf6, and now
if 33 Ke2 then 33....g6 34 Kd2 Rg8 35 Kc2 Ke6 36 Kb3
Kd6 37 Rh7 b6. The computers suggest 33 a4 g6 34 b5,
which wins a pawn and probably gives very good
winning chances, but the game is not yet over.’
10998. Alekhine
in San Francisco
From page 16 of the San Francisco Chronicle, 28
February 1924:
The reference to ‘blindfolded’ in the heading is not to
be taken literally. Regarding the number of games
played, a chart of Alekhine’s exhibitions in Canada and
the United States from November 1923 to April 1924 on
page 154 of the July-August 1924 American Chess
Bulletin specified 32 (+24 –3 =5), figures also
given on pages 217 and 771 of the Skinner/Verhoeven
volume on Alekhine. The full chart was reproduced on
page 3 of Alekhine in the Americas by J.
Donaldson, N. Minev and Y. Seirawan (Seattle, 1992).
A curiosity about Alekhine and Neo-Chess from page 7 of
the San Francisco Examiner, 29 February 1924:
10999.
The grandmaster title
An imminent addition to Chess Ratings and
Titles is this observation by W.A. Fairhurst on
page 134 of the April 1955 BCM:
‘Many players will agree that there are too many
international masters and far too many so-called
grandmasters. Lasker, Capablanca and Alekhine could be
considered of such high rank amongst the masters of
the past that they were entitled to such a distinction
as grandmaster, but it is doubtful if there is a
single player living at present worthy of this title.
Botvinnik, Keres, Smyslov and Reshevsky are all fine
players but they have not that superiority over some
of the other leading masters which entitles them to be
described as “grand”. In addition to these four there
are apparently 37 other grandmasters, and this makes
the distinction almost meaningless.’
11000. A
simultaneous display by Josef Krejcik
From page 191 of The Even More Complete Chess
Addict by Mike Fox and Richard James (London,
1993):
The phrase ‘according to Chess’ takes the
reader nowhere.
The following is on page 12 of Josef Krejcik’s book Mein
Abschied
vom Schach (Berlin, 1955):
Krejcik states that his hosts had induced him to drink
alcohol before the exhibition but places the performance
at Whitsun (zu Pfingsten). That undermines the
‘worst birthday present in chess history’ claim, given
that he was born on 22 January 1885.
Can information on the display be found in any 1910
publications?
Regarding poor results in simultaneous exhibitions, see
too C.N. 2816 (on page 71 of Chess Facts and Fables)
and C.N. 6451.
11001.
Castling the adversary’s queen
The subsequent item on page 191 of the Fox/James book
mentioned in C.N. 11000:
Below is the relevant part of page 103 of Chess
Pieces by Norman Knight (London, 1949):
The passage in Strathmore had been disinterred
by Philip H. Williams
on page 281 of the June 1908 Chess Amateur (also
with a comment about nestling behind):
11002.
Scheveningen, 1923
From page 189 of CHESS, May 1940, in an article
entitled ‘Last-Round Surprises’ by S. Tartakower (pages
186-190):
Maróczy annotated his loss to Oskam on pages 101-102 of
the Scheveningen, 1923 tournament book published by
Bernhard Kagan:
1 d4 d5 2 Nf3 Nf6 3 e3 e6 4 Bd3 c5 5 c3 Be7 6 Nbd2 O-O
7 Ne5 Nbd7 8 f4 Ne8 9 O-O f5 10 g4 Ndf6 11 g5 Ne4 12 h4
Bd7 13 Qf3 b5 14 Qh3 c4 15 Bc2 b4 16 Ndf3 bxc3 17 bxc3
Nxc3 18 h5 Nd6 19 Ng6 Re8 20 Ba3 Nce4 21 Nfe5
21...Nc8 22 Rab1 Bxa3 23 Rb7 Nb6 24 Nxd7 Nd6 25 Nxb6
axb6 26 White resigns.
However, according to pages 104-105 of the tournament
book it was another game, Johner v Fick, which won the
prize for the first game to end in the final round:
1 d4 d5 2 c4 c6 3 e3 Nf6 4 Nf3 Bg4 5 cxd5 Nxd5 6 e4 Nf6
7 Nc3 e6 8 Be3 Be7 9 Qc2 Bxf3 10 gxf3 Qa5 11 Rg1 g6 12
O-O-O b5 13 Kb1 Nbd7
14 d5 exd5 15 exd5 exd5 16 Nxd5 Nxd5 17 Rxd5 a6 18 Bh3
f5 19 Qc6 [Kf7 and Black resigns].
In the exchanges on d5 a pair of moves was missing from
the tournament book, and our game-score above follows
what appeared on page 3 of the Nieuwe Rotterdamsche
Courant, 4 August 1923, which discussed both
games:
11003.
FIDE politics: a basic question (C.N. 10923)
C.N. 10923 suggested a basic question to ask anybody
aspiring to lead FIDE:
If you are elected FIDE President, what are the main
specific changes that the chess world will see A)
after one year, and B) after four years?
The question has been put to Arkady Dvorkovich by
Macauley Peterson in a ChessBase
interview.
11004. Pitiful
Mention of Arkady Dvorkovich in C.N. 11003 prompts
Olimpiu G. Urcan (Singapore) to point out these Twitter
exchanges involving Nigel Short and Raymond Keene:
Raymond Keene’s inability to recognize Arkady
Dvorkovich is as pitiful as his pride in the defilement
of the Simpson’s-in-the-Strand chessboard (as shown on a
Kingpin
webpage).
11005. The
choice of openings
‘The lower the level of play, the less it matters
what opening is chosen ...’
C.H.O’D. Alexander, BCM, July 1955, page 216.
11006. A
simultaneous display by Josef Krejcik (C.N. 11000)
Peter Anderberg (Harmstorf, Germany) notes pages 36-37
of Krejcik’s book Artige und unartige Kinder der
Schachmuse (Leipzig, 1925), which refers to an
11-board simultaneous display (Whitsun, 1910) on peg
chess sets (11 losses):
Our correspondent remarks:
‘This text is part of the section “Aus meinem
Leben: Dichtung” (“From my Life: Poetry” ), so the
entire story seems to be fictitious.’
11007.
White to move
This position will be discussed in the next C.N. item.
11008. Victor Rush
From pages 282-283 of the August 1915 BCM:
Rush lived until 1951, and a brief obituary is on page
118 of the April 1951 BCM.
This cutting is from Brian Harley’s column in the Observer,
7 April 1935, page 31:
The initial position was shown in C.N. 11007:
Mate in seven: 1 Qxh6 gxh6 2 Ne7+ Kf8 3 Rg8+ Kxe7 4
Nd5+ Ke6 5 f5+ Kxd5 6 c4+ Kc6 7 d5 mate.
11009. Los
Angeles, 1940
From the Los Angeles Times, 8 September 1940,
Part L, page 12:
The participants in the tournament were Borochow, Fine,
Steiner and Woliston. Page 244 of Reuben Fine by
Aidan Woodger (Jefferson, 2004) observed:
‘Fine had a relatively easy time in this tournament
(which is erroneously dated 1941 in his autobiography,
and hence several other sources).’
11010. Grossmeister
An unusual instance of the term ‘Grandmaster’ to
describe a problemist occurs at the start of the
obituary of Karl Kockelkorn on page 248 of Schachjahrbuch
1914 II. Teil by Ludwig Bachmann (Ansbach, 1914):
11011.
The Wallace murder case
A passage from Chess and
the Wallace Murder Case, where we referred to
books by Robert F. Hussey and Jonathan Goodman:
On page 171 Hussey wrote: ‘Barrister Abrahams states:
“The judge ... summed up strongly for acquittal.”’ He
did indeed, and it is perhaps surprising to find the
following on page 309 of Goodman:
‘A few years before his death, in an interview with
a Liverpool Echo reporter, he [Mr Justice
Wright, who took the title Lord Wright of Durley]
said:
“Never forget that Wallace was a chessplayer. ...
I should say that, broadly speaking, any man with
common sense would have said that Wallace’s alibi
was too good to be true, but that is not an
argument you can hang a man on.”’
Lord Wright died in 1964, but no precise source for
the Liverpool newspaper interview was supplied by
Goodman.
Now, Gerard Killoran (Ilkley, England) provides the
article, which was by Robert Jackson and was published
on page 8 of the Liverpool Echo and Evening Express,
27 November 1958:
Larger
version
11012. Josef
Krejcik (C.N.s 11000 & 11006)
Harry Golombek’s review of Mein Abschied vom Schach
on pages 323-324 of the November 1955 BCM:
Since Golombek singled out the ‘portraitures’, the full
set is shown here, on pages 18-22 of Krejcik’s book:
11013.
Morgan on Chernev
Immediately after the review of the Krejcik book (C.N.
11012), page 324 of the November 1955 BCM had an
assessment by D.J. Morgan of Chernev’s 1000 Best
Short Games of Chess:
11014.
London, 1927
From page 188 of CHESS, May 1940, below is a
further extract from the article by Tartakower referred
to in C.N. 11002:
In the first paragraph, the word ‘previous’ is
inapposite; Tartakower v Réti was the last-round game.
Against Colle, Nimzowitsch was White, not Black; he
annotated the game on pages 73-76 of Die Praxis
meines Systems (Berlin, 1930).
Having annotated his win over Réti, Tartakower
discussed the aftermath of the London, 1927 tournament
on page 201 of his first volume of Best Games
(London, 1953).
In CHESS, Tartakower stated that a telegram was
sent to Buenos Aires, whereas his book had the phrase
‘contemplated sending ... a challenge to Buenos Aires’.
On page 270 of the French edition, Tartacover vous
parle (Paris, 1953), the wording was ‘envisageait
... de lancer à Buenos-Aires un défi’.
11015. 1 d4 Nf6
A remark by Tartakower on page 37 of the Wiener
Schachzeitung, April 1923:
11016.
Morphy v Anderssen (C.N. 9519)
White to move
Regarding this position (a variation given by
Tartakower and du Mont), C.N. 9519 showed Edgard
Tchélébi’s observation on page 232 of Le secret de
Morphy (Limoges, 1960) that White can play 14 Ne6
Qe8 15 Nc5+ dxc5 16 Nxf6+.
We add now that Tchélébi had given similar analysis on
page 80 of the February 1955 BCM:
11017.
Alekhine’s château (C.N.s 4250, 4251, 4262 & 4345)
Bob Kane (London) notes another website
at which accommodation in Alekhine’s
château in St Aubin-le-Cauf can be booked. One
photograph at the website is of a room
with a chess set.
11018. Records
‘On 17 July 2013, Garry Turner (UK) attached 161
clothes pegs to his face on the set of Rekorlar
Dünyasi in Istanbul, Turkey.’
A photograph of Mr Turner’s head, virtually hidden by
the attachments, takes up much of page 93 of Guinness
World Records 2019 (London, 2018). The book has
scores, if not hundreds, of similar items, and
especially in the gross ‘Food Feats’ section.
In our annual doleful
duty, we note that the 2019 edition has an index
entry for clothes pegs but not for chess. However, the
latter is mentioned twice in the ‘Stop Press’ section on
pages 254-255:
Following on from the latter item, we seek detailed
information about the rook in the playing area of the
1974 Olympiad in Nice.
Europe Echecs, 5
July 1974, front cover
The photograph was also on page 155.
Europe Echecs, 5
August 1974, front cover
(Acknowledgement for the two Europe Echecs
photographs: Cleveland Public Library)
Schweizerische
Schachzeitung, July 1974, front cover
BCM, August 1974,
page 291
Chess Life &
Review, October 1974, page 661.
11019. Nice, 1974
From the back cover of the Nice, 1974 Olympiad
bulletins:
Major chess events often have, understandably, a logo
(C.N. 10672), but any possible reason for a mascot is
hard to discern.
11020.
Lasker v Euwe
Noting that Emanuel Lasker was 67 when he defeated Euwe
at Nottingham, 1936, José Carlos Santos (Porto,
Portugal) asks whether any even older player has ever
beaten a reigning world champion under standard
tournament or match conditions.
We add that Lasker’s famous win was discussed on pages
23-24 of the January 1937 Australasian Chess Review
in an article by T.A. Krishnamachari. Its title,
‘Cross-Attack’, is a seldom-seen technical term.
This photograph of T.A. Krishnamachari (also:
Krishnamachariar) is taken from an article about him by
T.R. Dawson on pages 31-32 of the January 1940 BCM.
See too C.N. 3391 on pages 220-221 of Chess Facts
and Fables, and the entry on pages 214-215 of Indian
Chess History 570 AD-2010 AD by Manuel Aaron and
Vijay D. Pandit (Chennai, 2014).
11021
Alekhine v Capablanca
The Dover reprint of the New York, 1924 tournament
included a few post-1924 photographs, including this
one:
The phrase ‘meet for a game’ appears to be captionese,
but is any more information available regarding the
occasion?
11022. Incomplete
No volume entitled Complete Book of Chess History
is ever likely to be published, for obvious sound
reasons, but the word ‘complete’ is widely tolerated in
the titles of beginners’ chess books.
Cardoza Publishing, Las Vegas has just brought out a
new edition of Complete Book of Beginning Chess
by Raymond Keene. As shown in Cuttings and on other
C.N. pages, the previous edition (2003) had innumerable
factual errors, such as this double mishap on page 241:
‘I’m not good at attention to detail’, stated Mr Keene
uncontroversially on page 17 of the November 1990 CHESS.
Since he is hopeless at chess history, the innumerable
factual errors in the 2003 edition of Complete Book
of Beginning Chess were mostly, though by no
means only, in the last 100 or so pages, in the chapters
entitled ‘The Heroes of Chess’, ‘The History of Chess’
and ‘The Best Games Ever Played’.
In the 2018 edition no textual amendments have
been made anywhere (‘Rèti’ is still the spelling passim),
except that, gratifyingly, those three final chapters
have been silently removed.
There remains the logical conundrum of how the 2003
title Complete Book of Beginning Chess could be
retained in 2018 for a new edition which is under half
the weight of its predecessor and has deleted about one
third of the content completely.
11023. Kasparov
interview for learners of Russian
An addition to C.N. 8684 concerns pages 123-131 of part
four of Читаем без проблем by N.A. Kostiuk (St
Petersburg, 2013):
Page 127 specifies the source of the interview: Аргументы
и факты, 50/2003 and 3/2004.
11024.
The Predecessors series (C.N. 9839)
Have any corrected editions of Kasparov’s Predecessors
series been published?
This illustration comes from pages 46-47 of the work
mentioned in C.N. 9839: Chamo-me ... Garry Kasparov
(Lisbon, 2011), Me llamo ... Garri Kasparov
(Badalona, 2013) and Em dic ... Garri Kasparov
(Badalona, 2013).
11025.
Maróczy in conversation
On page 256 of CHESS, June 1947 B.H. Wood
reported on a conversation with Géza Maróczy at Baarn,
1947:
11026. Chess and politics
‘Your memory is regrettably short. Have you never
heard of the Bordell case ...?’
See our latest feature
article.
11027. Marshall
v Chernev
Eduardo Bauzá Mercére (New York, NY, USA) has forwarded
a game between Frank James Marshall and Irving Chernev
(simultaneous exhibition, Brooklyn, 6 December 1919) on
page 2 of section one of the Brooklyn Daily Eagle,
11 December 1919:
1 e4 e5 2 d4 exd4 3 c3 dxc3 4 Bc4 Nf6 5 Nxc3 d6 6 Qb3
Qe7 7 Nge2 Nbd7 8 O-O Nb6 9 Bg5 Nxc4 10 Qxc4 c6 11 Nf4
Qe5 12 Bxf6 Qxf6
13 Nfd5 Qd8 14 Rae1 Be6 15 f4 Rc8 16 Qa4 Bd7 17 Ne3 Qb6
18 Kh1 Be7 19 Nf5 Bxf5 20 exf5 Kf8 21 Qc2 d5 22 Nxd5 Qc5
23 Nc3 Bf6 24 Rf3 b5
25 Rfe3 Bd4 26 Re7 Bxc3 27 bxc3 Qxe7 28 Rxe7 Kxe7 29
Qe4+ Kf8 30 Qb4+ Ke8 31 Qd4 Rd8 32 Qe3+ Kf8 33 h4 h5 34
Qxa7 Rh6 Drawn.
Marshall’s other game, against Broughton and Lafleur:
1 e4 e5 2 d4 d6 3 Nf3 Nc6 4 Bc4 Nf6 5 Ng5 d5 6 exd5
Nxd4 7 d6 Be6 8 Nxe6 Nxe6 9 Bxe6 fxe6 10 dxc7 Qxc7 11
O-O Be7 12 Nc3 O-O 13 Bg5 Rac8 14 Qe2 Nd5 15 Nxd5 exd5
16 Bxe7 Qxe7 17 Rad1 Rfd8 18 c3 Rc6 19 Rd3 Qf6 20 Rfd1
d4 21 cxd4 exd4 22 h3 Rcd6 23 Qe4 Drawn.
By chance, Olimpiu G. Urcan (Singapore) has sent us the
chess column on page 8 of the Washington Post,
15 February 1920, which had the same two games and a
similar text. He adds that a report on Marshall’s
display had been published on page 2 of section one of
the 8 December 1919 edition of the Brooklyn Daily
Eagle:
11028. A
1934 chess cartoon
An addition to ‘From
Former Times (Chess)’:
Source: Chess Review, August 1934, page 133.
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