ISSUU - Mede In Turkey May 2012 by ?stmag Magazin Grubu
Mede In Turkey May 2012
Mede In Turkey May 2012
Mede In Turkey Newspaper May 2012Factfinder
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A priceless addition to
comes from page 99 of the April 1924 American
Chess Bulletin. The passage is by Ernest Reel and
was quoted from the Milwaukee Sentinel:
‘A woman’s mind is a market place crowded with so many
mental reflections that it is hardly fair to ask her to
concentrate on what is purely a man’s game. Chess is the
weak spot in her mental armor. When a woman plays at
chess she is apt to rest her chin on her hand and
incidentally display her rings. While in deep meditation
as to how to capture the king she suddenly is attracted
by the arrival of a friend clad in exquisite furs. The
fair player’s thoughts are diverted to the smart apparel
shop. As soon as her strict attention slips its anchor
the winning move of the chess game, which would stick
like a burr in a man’s mind, rises like a shadow across
her memory. Her chess atmosphere then becomes foggy, and
the social atmosphere decidedly clear.
Women trying to play chess are like people leading
horses they dare not ride. It will never be a woman’s
game. Sammy Rzeschewski need only fear the rivalry of
Cecil [sic – Celia] Neimark until her avenue of
understanding includes the boulevards of dress, society
and love. Up to that period a woman may win at chess –
after that she has other battles to conquer.’
Chapter 3 of Tony Miles: ‘It’s Only Me’ is
entitled ‘A cable’, referring to a well-known story about
Dubna, 1976 (related on page 14). Prior to his departure
for the tournament he was asked (by Eddie Penn, according
to the book) to send a cable if he succeeded in qualifying
for the grandmaster title. In due course, one was received
from Dubna:
‘A cable – Tony Miles.’
Are further details available and, in particular, has the
message been kept?
By becoming a grandmaster, Miles won the ?5,000 prize
offered by J.D. Slater. Reporting this, CHESS
(March 1976, page 173) added, ‘not to mention Faber’s
?1,000 in advance royalties for a book’. What subsequently
no such work was ever published by
the company.
involving Nimzowitsch and a variable supporting cast
(Lasker, Vidmar, Tartakower, Bogoljubow, Maróczy and
Lederer) is a godsend for a certain type of ahistorical
chess author. He may even decide to write a playlet:
Source: page 86 of Chess Beginner to Expert by
Larry Evans (Wellesley Hills, 1967).
color="#cc. Piece sacrifice anticipated (C.N.
Concerning the sixth match-game against Euwe, 1937 the
following remark by Alekhine appeared in his second Best
Games collection after 1 d4 d5 2 c4 c6 3 Nc3 dxc4 4
‘It is almost incredible that this quite natural move
has not been considered by the so-called theoreticians.
White obtains now an appreciable advantage in
development, no matter what Black replies.’
Following 4...e5 5 Bxc4 exd4 there came 6 Nf3, ‘yet
another of Alekhine’s sacrificial hazards, which would
hardly bear repetition’ in the words of R.N. Coles on page
77 of Dynamic Chess (London, 1956).
C.N. 1181 (see page 96 of Chess Explorations)
gave a game dated 13 years earlier:
José Fernández Migoya – N.N.
Havana, 1924
Queen’s Gambit Declined
1 d4 d5 2 c4 c6 3 Nc3 dxc4 4 e4 e5 5 Nf3 exd4
6 Bxc4 dxc3 7 Bxf7+ Ke7 8 Qb3 Nf6 9 O-O Na6 10 Bg5 h6 11
Bh4 g5 12 Nxg5 hxg5 13 Bxg5 Bg7 14 e5 Rf8 15 exf6+ Bxf6 16
Rfe1+ Kd6 17 Rad1+ Kc7 18 Bf4+ Resigns.
At a library in Havana in 1986 we copied down this score
from page 74 of 120 Partidas Cortas de Ajedrez by
Gumersindo Martínez (Havana, 1947). Now we are able to
show the page, courtesy of the Cleveland Public Library:
, which had just been agreed upon (‘The
champion will not be compelled to defend his title for a
purse below $10,000’).
color="#cc. Spot the chess master
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Duplication
Source: Chess Review, March 1953, page 77.
reported on the front page of the Daily Mail, 25
March 1946, with a seamless blend of rumour and error:
C.N. 5943 listed the complete set of Sergeant’s non-chess
books in our collection. They scarcely look like
money-spinners.
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A number of C.N. items have referred to Stephen Fry, who
gave us permission to reproduce a photograph of him
playing chess with Hugh Laurie and to quote some extracts
from his writings on the game.
These items, together with other information, have now
been brought together in .
color="#cc. Article on simultaneous chess in The
1 c4 Nf6 2 d4 g6 3 Nc3 Bg7
4 e4 d6 5 f3 O-O 6 Be3 Nc6 7 Qd2 Re8 8 Nge2 Rb8 9 O-O-O
a6 10 h4 h5 11 Bg5 b5 12 g4 hxg4
13 Bg2 Na5 14 cxb5 Nc4 15 Qf4 Nh5 16 Qh2 axb5 17 Ng3 c5
18 Nxh5 gxh5 19 fxg4 Qa5 20 Kb1 b4 21 Nd5 Ra8 22 White
Golombek’s column was published on page 11 of the 11 June
1977 Review section of The Times. Concerning the
simultaneous display by Romanishin, further details and
games were given in ‘Young London v the IGMs’ by Leonard
Barden on pages 270-272 of the June 1977 BCM.
color="#cc. Carl Walcker (C.N.s 7926 &
Further to C.N. 7930, Pawe&#322; Dudzi&#324;ski (Ostrów
Wielkopolski, Poland) comments that his book Szachy
wojenne . War chess (C.N. 8204) gave
Walcker’s results in the Cracow championship as follows:
First championship:
December 1940-January 1941 (elimination tourney): 1.
Schmek. Walcker and Nowarra were probably joint second.
February-March 1941 (final): 1. Walcker (7 1/2 /8).
Second championship:
November 1941: 1. Mross (7/7) ... 3-4. Walcker and
Meynecke (4 1/2 /7).
Third championship:
February-March 1942: 1. Mross (6 1/2 /7) 2. Walcker (5/7).
Fourth championship:
December 1942 (?)-January 1943: 1. Meynecke (7/9) ...
6-7. Walcker and Antonetty (4 1/2 /9).
Fifth championship:
February-March 1944: results unknown, but the game won
by Walcker as Black against Antonetty was given on page
200 of our correspondent’s book.
Mr Dudzi&#324;ski adds:
‘Games played by Walcker were published in the Goniec
Krakowski on 31 October 1943, 16 January 1944 and 2
April 1944. The full run of the newspaper’s chess
column can be viewed online.
Alekhine and Bogoljubow stayed at Walcker’s home
during their visits to Cracow. A photograph of his
daughter, Maria Pritulecka or Prytulecka, and a game
played by her are on page 69 of my book.’
color="#cc. The Wyvill formation (C.N. 8256)
From Joose Norri (Helsinki):
‘In an article in the 7-8/2003 issue of Suomen
Shakki I pointed out, on pages 234 and 244, that
there is some confusion about the Wyvill formation.
Firstly, Tarrasch attributes to Wyvill the stratagem
...Na5, ...Ba6 and ...Rc8, whereas Euwe/Kramer and
Kmoch use his name to describe the actual pawn
structure. More importantly, I believe that Tarrasch
was mistaken. No such game by Wyvill from London, 1851
exists. In one game, Wyvill v Anderssen, he had the
doubled pawns, but he is supposed to have recognized
the weakness of such pawns and not to have had them.
There are, however, two games played by Elijah
Williams at London, 1851 (Staunton v Williams and
particularly L?wenthal v Williams) which fit the
description. Williams never had time to carry out the
whole manoeuvre with the knight, bishop and rook, but
he clearly intended it.
There remains the question of whether Wyvill used
the idea somewhere else.’
color="#cc. Agatha Christie (C.N.s
Alexander Kotov’s assessment of Agatha Christie was
reported by Harry Golombek in The Times Saturday
Review, 25 April 1981, page 9:
Below is the remark about ‘even a Russian’ (which was
addressed to Hercule Poirot) in ‘A Chess Problem’, as
published in the edition of Agatha Christie’s book The
Big Four referred to in C.N. 4105:
also quotes a remark of his from page 48 of The
Observer (Review section), 22 June 1980:
‘Golf is the only sport that has snooker beaten as a
television event. Mediocre golf is like mediocre
anything else, but top-level golf is like chess in
Cinerama ...’
has been expanded to include three
articles from The Listener which Stephen Fry has
kindly authorized us to reproduce.
Another new feature article is Jacob Bronowski and Chess.
In a piece about Bronowski on page 13 of the 5 October
1974 issue of The Times Harry Golombek wrote, ‘I
have no illustrative game of his available’, and we
currently have the moves of only one game. Can any others
color="#cc. Copying (Christian Hesse)
Regarding The Joys of Chess by Christian Hesse
(Alkmaar, 2011), C.N. 7083 observed that ‘many positions
and other material are taken from Chess Notes, in exchange
for a one-line mention of our website in a list on page
427)’. That C.N. item is included in the feature article Copying.
An article
by Hesse posted at ChessBase on 13 September 2013
highlights his inability even to copy accurately. An
example is his position ‘N.N.-Caro, Berlin 1898’. Below is
part of C.N. 3096, posted on the Internet in 2003 and
given on page 12 of Chess Facts and Fables. It
concerns our research into queen sacrifices on g6 or g3
(as set out in ):
Hesse availed himself of this position on page 175 of Expeditionen
Schachwelt (Nettetal, 2006), on page 183 of the
English edition, The Joys of Chess, and in his
ChessBase article, without a word of attribution. All
three times he stated categorically that the venue was
Berlin (our cautious question mark was dispensed with) and
he was ten years out with the date of the game, putting
‘1898’. His neglect to mention a source reduced his
chances of realizing the
discrepancy during the
seven years since he first published in his work an
inaccurate, simplified version of ours.
Naturally, other writers and researchers are also the
victims of Hesse’s unconscionable approach. His ChessBase
article blunders spectacularly by attributing to G.A.
MacDonnell a game played more than a decade after his
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includes a
game between A.W. Fox and A. Clerc played at the Café de
la Régence, Paris and published on page 146 of the July
1901 issue of the American Chess World:
Rick Massimo (Providence, RI, USA) notes that the
conclusion was one of two positions on cards sent by the
United States Chess Federation to domestic postal players
to acknowledge receipt of a game result:
The second position on the card will be discussed in a
later item.
lists a number of compositions on which he collaborated
with Norman Martin Gibbins, and Steven B. Dowd
(Birmingham, AL, USA) points out a website offering information
about Gibbins.
We add that a brief illustration of Bronowski’s play was
published on page 15 of volume two of Learn Chess: A
New Way for All by C.H.O’D. Alexander and T.J. Beach
(Oxford, 1963):
The solution on page 185:
In the algebraic edition (Oxford, 1987) the page numbers
are 13 and 156.
From W. Ritson Morry’s report about Hastings, 1961-62 on
pages 33-34 of the February 1962 BCM:
‘The congress was opened, after the Mayor (Alderman G.
[sic – C.] Barfoot, JP) had welcomed the
competitors, by a chessplayer of no mean skill in the
person of Dr J. Bronowski, who discarded most of the
usual platitudes in favour of a really amusing account
of his own chess career, which proceeded rather on the
lines of the applicant for the Indian Civil Service who
had “failed entrance examination Allahabad University
1922”. The good doctor had managed to lose to almost
every grandmaster in the room and quite a few more, some
of them when they were of very tender years, such as
Sammy Reshevsky when a boy prodigy (for whom he was
momentarily mistaken at a display and given a big round
of applause), and Johnny Penrose way back in 1945. It
was all excellent fun, and when someone accidentally
“crowned” chairman Percy Morren [the President of the
Hastings Chess Club] with a demonstration board the
large crowd’s day was really complete.’
color="#cc. Isolani (C.N.s
Javier Asturiano Molina (Murcia, Spain) notes that
Nimzowitsch used the word ‘isolani’ not only in Mein
System but also, around the same time, on page 485
of the October-December 1926 issue of Kagans Neueste
Schachnachrichten. As his annotations to the game
(H. von Gottschall v Nimzowitsch, Hanover, 1926) are
different from those on pages 163-165 of his book Die
Praxis meines Systems (Berlin, 1930), the full game
is reproduced here from pages 485-487 of the magazine:
It is not only the annotations that are different. Quite
apart from the misnumbering of some moves above, there are
discrepancies in the score compared to the version in Die
Praxis meines Systems and on pages 66-67 of Kongressbuch
Hannover 1926 (Berlin, 1926). Has either player’s
score-sheet survived?
, by Robert B. Wormald, Poul Rasch
Nielsen and Hans Peter Rehm.
Alekhine tried several times to become a French
citizen between 1924 and 1927 and finally obtained
citizenship with the support of Fernand Gavarry, who
was the President of the French Chess Federation and a
Plenipotentiary Minister at the Foreign Affairs
Ministry. On 20 April 1927 Gavarry sent a letter on
the Federation’s stationery asking the French
authorities to grant Alekhine French citizenship so
that he could lead the national team at the first
International Team Tournament, to be held in London in
July 1927. However, Alekhine had to await the
promulgation of a new Law on naturalization to obtain
a French passport.
My page also comments on Alekhine’s date
of birth (C.N.s& 4719 and 4739). I report
too that in April 1922, three months after his arrival
in France, Alekhine was suspected of Bolshevism,
which, besides his frequent trips abroad, contributed
to delays in the processing of his naturalization
application between 1924 and 1927.’
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This well-known jape is, rather inaptly, the opening
passage in Chess for Young People by F. Reinfeld
(New York, 1961), page 3.
Page 14 of another Reinfeld book published the same year,
The Joys of Chess, also gave the story, the first
player being described as an Englishman. That article of
Reinfeld’s, ‘32 Ways to Go Crazy’, was reprinted from Esquire,
March 1953.
a puzzle which, it is stated, attracted the attention of
color="#cc. Alekhine in Rotterdam, 1933
Harrie Grondijs (Rijswijk, the Netherlands) informs us
that he recently acquired the score-sheet and certificate
of C.J.F. B?ttcher () for his victory over
Alekhine in a 50-board simultaneous display:
Alexander Alekhine – Carl Johann Friedrich B?ttcher
Rotterdam, 14 November 1933
Sicilian Defence
1 e4 c5 2 Nf3 Nc6 3 d4 cxd4 4 Nxd4 Nf6 5 Nc3 d6 6 Bg5 e6
7 Bb5 Bd7 8 O-O Qb6 9 Be3 Qc7 10 f3 h5 11 Qd2 Be7 12 Rad1
a6 13 Be2 Ne5 14 Qc1 h4 15 f4 Neg4 16 Bxg4 Nxg4 17 h3 Nxe3
18 Qxe3 Qb6 19 Rf3 Rc8 20 b3
20...e5 21 fxe5 dxe5 22 Nd5 exd4 23 Qf4 Qg6 24 Qe5 Qd6 25
Qxg7 Rf8 26 Rxd4 Rxc2 27 e5 Qc5 28 e6
28...Rc1+ 29 Kh2 Bd6+ 30 Nf4 Bxe6 31 b4 Bxf4+ 32 Rfxf4
Qc7 33 Qf6 Qe7 34 Qe5 Rg8 35 Rfe4 Rc2 36 Qb8+ Rc8 37 Qe5
Qg5 38 Qxg5 Rxg5 39 Rxh4 Rc2 40 Rd1 Rgxg2+ 41 Kh1 Rh2+ 42
White resigns.
of Goldene
Schachzeiten by Milan Vidmar (Berlin, 1961). It will
be noted that, despite the length of the passage, Vidmar
could not give particulars.
On page 502 of the September 1976 Chess Life &
Review Tim Krabbé referred to Vidmar’s account, and
his next paragraph turned to Breyer v Esser, Budapest,
1917, with a suggestion that White craftily touched his
unmovable queen’s rook so as to be ‘forced’ to play a
brilliant king move (14 Kf1). However, that was all
related by Krabbé merely on a ‘the story has it that ...’
color="#cc. Simultaneous display in Newcastle
From page 2 of the Newcastle Courant, 24 November
Joseph Henry Blackburne – H.W. Hawks
Newcastle, 13 or 14 November 1894
Vienna Gambit
1 e4 e5 2 Nc3 Nf6 3 f4 d5 4 d3 Bb4 5 fxe5 Nxe4 6 dxe4
Qh4+ 7 Ke2 Bg4+ 8 Nf3 Bxc3 9 bxc3 dxe4 10 Qd4 Bh5 11 Ke3
Bxf3 12 Bb5+ c6 13 gxf3 cxb5 14 Qxe4 Qxe4+ 15 Kxe4 Nc6
16 Rg1 g6 17 Bg5 O-O 18 Bf6 Rac8 19 Rad1 Na5 20 Rd3 Rc4+
21 Ke3 Rfc8 22 Rgd1 Rxc3 23 Rxc3 Rxc3+ 24 Kd2 Rc8 25 Kc1
h5 26 Rd7 Kf8 27 f4 Ke8 28 Re7+ Kf8 29 Rd7 Ke8 30 Rd5 a6
31 a4 Nc4 32 axb5 Ne3 33 Rd6 axb5 34 Rb6 Rxc2+ 35 Kb1 Rb2+
36 Ka1 Nc4 37 Rxb7 Rxh2 38 Rxb5 Kd7 39 Rb7+ Ke6 40 Re7+
Kf5 41 Rxf7 Kxf4 42 e6 Rh1+ 43 Ka2 Rh2+ 44 Kb3 Na5+ 45 Ka4
(‘Mr Blackburne was pleased with this curious ending, and
after playing it over to a number of amateurs he
recommended it for publication.’) 45...Re2 46 e7 Nc6
47 Be5+ Kg5 48 e8(Q) Nxe5 49 Qd8+ Kh6 50 Re7 Re4+ 51 Kb3
51...Rb4+ 52 Ka3 Nc6 53 Qd2+ g5 54 Qd6 mate.
color="#cc. Past grand master
Following publication of the first edition of the Oxford
Chess by David Hooper and Kenneth Whyld (Oxford,
1984), C.N. 848 quoted from the entry on ‘Grandmaster’
(page 132):
‘A correspondent writing to Bell’s Life 18 Feb.
1838 refers to Lewis as “our past grand master”,
probably the first use of this term in connection with
On page 156 of the second edition of the Companion
(Oxford, 1992) ‘grand master’ was changed, incorrectly, to
‘grandmaster’.
Olimpiu G. Urcan (Singapore) provides the full letter,
from page 4 of the 18 February 1838 issue of Bell’s
Life and Sporting Chronicle, contributed by ‘Un
vieux moustache, The Wigwam, Carisbrooke’:
The relevant passage:
‘I have heard and smiled much about this graduated
scale of Chess talent. Cannot we venture to draw some
indistinct sketch of Chess precedence. I believe there
are only three forms, and then follows the motley group
of aspirants. Let us first place our past grand master,
Lewis, on the platform of exclusive privilege, and
behold him lifting up his hands with that unaffected
courtesy so peculiarly his own – let us fancy him, I
say, in this exhorting posture, beseeching the three
forms below to abhor all rancorous
and that, although they can never reach his
distinguished eminence, yet they possessed merit of no
common order, and were eligible for high consideration.’
See too our latest feature article, Chess Grandmasters.
William Lewis (detail from
opposite page 197 of the New York, 1859 edition of F.M.
Edge’s book on Morphy)
There have come to light no pre-1838 occurrences of the
term ‘grand master’ or ‘grandmaster’ in a chess context,
or any pre-1984 mentions of the Bell’s Life citation.
Companion should thus continue to receive full
credit for a significant discovery, and no honest writer
would hesitate to give such credit.
Under the title ‘Grandmasterly research’ Raymond Keene
wrote on page 5 of The Times, 7 November 1994
about claims that the grandmaster title was created by
Tsar Nicholas II at St Petersburg, 1914, and he then
‘Following up a clue from the Oxford Companion to
Chess, Barry Martin, chess captain of the Chelsea
Arts Club, has now demonstrated that the term is
considerably older.
Martin’s research shows that in Bells Life [sic],
Sunday paper, of February 18, 1838, a leading British
player, William Lewis, is referred to as “our past
grandmaster” [sic]. Here is a sample of play by
the man whom the latest research indicates to have been
the first player described as a grandmaster in print.’
Barry Martin had not demonstrated or researched anything.
In an article about Staunton in the October 1994 CHESS
he had merely given&the Bell’s Life quote
about Lewis (see page 34), without bothering to
acknowledge that it had been published by the Companion
a decade previously. Nor was the Companion
credited when Martin’s article was reproduced on pages
191-201 of Staunton’s City by Raymond Keene and
Barry Martin (Aylesbeare, 2004).
It is also worth dwelling on Keene’s deceitful
introductory words in The Times:
‘Following up a clue from the Oxford Companion to
Chess, Barry Martin ... has now demonstrated ...’
The Companion did not supply ‘a clue’. It
supplied the exact relevant text supported by a precisely
dated reference.
Worse was to follow. On page 100 of The Spectator,
4 July 1998 Keene made no mention of the Companion
and affirmed flatly:
‘Lewis, according to research by Barry Martin, the
secretary of the Staunton Society, was the first player
to be described as a grandmaster.’
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It is possible to find Donner referred to as Hein, Jan
Hein, Jan-Hein, Jan H., J. Hein, H., J., J.H., Johannes
Hendrikus and perhaps other variants too.
Which version or versions should be preferred, and which
are simply wrong?
color="#cc. Alekhine and cats (C.N.s 4794
José Fernando Blanco (Madrid) enquires about reports that
Alekhine had feline company at the board during his 1935
world championship match against Euwe.
The most direct evidence that we can quote is Euwe’s
comment in an interview with Pal Benko on page 411 of the
August 1978 Chess Life & Review:
‘Alekhine was very superstitious. He had a Siamese cat,
and sometimes before a game he would put the cat on the
chessboard to smell it. He could not play with the cat
in his lap, so he wore a sweater with the cat’s picture
on it. These things did not disturb me in the first
match in 1935. Either Alekhine was not normal or the
rest of us are not normal. Anyway, the fact that such a
great player as Alekhine needed little tricks like that
gave me encouragement.’
The portrait below comes from page 514 of the June 1899 American
Chess Magazine:
Magnus Smith
The possibility of 8 e5 dxe5 9 Bxf7+ had been referred to
in print when Magnus Smith was 12 years old, on page 175
of La Stratégie, 15 June 1882, in a note to
Blackburne v Paulsen, Vienna, 1882 (where the moves 8 e5
Ng4 were played).
A game in which 8 e5 dxe5 occurred, and which predates
Magnus Smith’s article, is K. Moll v W. Therkatz,
Düsseldorf, 1908, as published on pages 150-151 of the
tournament book:
To quote one later case, Mitchell v Feldman, Brighton,
1938 was published on page 85 of the July-August 1938 American
W.M.P. Mitchell and S. Feldman were participants in the
First Class B tournament of the British Chess Federation
Congress in Brighton (BCM, September 1938, page
418). As demonstrated in the present item, it would not be
justified to describe their game as featuring the ‘Magnus
Smith Trap’, but when was that term first used in print?
All bids will be welcome.
color="#cc. Donner (C.N. 8299)
Thomas Niessen (Aachen, Germany) quotes from page 308 of
The King by J.H. Donner (Alkmaar, 2006), at the end
of a review originally published in Schaakbulletin,
March 1979:
‘PS. In both books a “grandmaster Jan Hein Donner”
appears on occasion, sometimes referred to as “our Jan
Hein”. I’d like to point out that my name is: J.H.
Donner, to my few friends: Hein. “Jan Hein”, however, I
am not, have never been and wouldn’t want to be either.’
Source: page xviii of Second Piatigorsky Cup
(published by the Ward Ritchie Press, Los Angeles, 1968).
(1,246 books and magazines, but no private archives). It
is necessary to a) click on ‘Aquí’,& b) click
on ‘Consultar el catálogo’, c) in the ‘Buscando
en’ option, select ‘Bca. de Pablo Morán’, d)
type ajedrez in the box labelled ‘Materia’
and e) click on ‘Buscar’.
Pablo Morán’s best-known book is his monograph on
Alekhine, of which an English edition, edited and
translated by Frank X. Mur, was published by McFarland
& Company, Inc. in 1989. It was released in paperback
The English translation was a long-term project, as is
shown by a letter to us from Pablo Morán in September
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Source: American Chess Bulletin, November 1918,
page 234. The item came from the Evening World, 23
September 1918 and concerned a meeting of the
Correspondence Chess League of America.
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Columnists
C.N. 2331 (see page 157 of A Chess Omnibus)
commented:
Some of today’s chess reporters may care to note how
much work Amos Burn put into his weekly column in The
Field. To take the 16 May 1914 issue (pages
) as an example, the Englishman presented:
T the solutions to two previous
a lengthy report (over 200 lines) on St
Petersburg, 1914, including round-by-
eight annotated games an update on
results (up to 14 May); a brief report on the Gambit
Tournament in Baden, a feature on
Blackburne in Russia, with the text of a testimonial
letter to him from the St Petersburg Chess C a
replies-to-correspondents section (five items).
Elsewhere in that issue of The Field was a
portrait of the St Petersburg competitors and officials.
Burn’s column (actually five long columns, taking up
nearly two pages of the magazine) puts to shame the
‘work’ of most modern chess journalists.
At the time, our item did not show Burn’s column, but we
do so now:
Far from envying Burn, a chess columnist today should be
grateful for having infinitely less space to fill if he
cannot, even in far smaller quantities, produce
worthwhile, original material.
In such a case, the solution should be obvious ...
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Wanted: a brief biographical note on A. Livshits, the
author of the two volumes of Test Your Chess IQ
(Oxford, 1981). His forename was given as August on the
title pages of the second editions (Oxford, 1988 and
is upon us again. The 2014 edition (senselessly described
on the front cover as ‘officially amazing’) has only three
chess-related entries, the first of them on page 61:
‘Simultaneous blindfolded chess wins
In 1947, legendary chess player Miguel Najdorf
(Argentina) took on 45 players, holding each game
simultaneously in his head. Over 23 hr 25 min he won 39,
drew four and lost two. Najdorf had been forced to leave
his family in Poland at the start of World War II. All
died in concentration camps, but Najdorf hoped that if
he broke a record news might reach survivors. He was
never contacted.’
Page 96 has a feature on ‘largest toys’ which shows a
king 4 metres 46 high with a diameter of 1 metre 83 around
the base (St Louis, MO, USA, 24 April 2012).
Finally, page 111 recounts a feat which seems readily
‘Mehak Gul (Pakistan) sorted a chess set into the
opening set-up for a game in 45.48 seconds during the
Punjab Youth Festival at Expo Centre Lahore in Pakistan,
on 21 October 2012.’
Other achievements related on that same page include
‘Most toothpicks in a beard’, ‘Most mousetraps released on
the tongue in one minute’, ‘Most underpants pulled on’,
‘Most rubber bands stretched over the face’ and ‘Longest
time spinning a basketball on a toothbrush’.
color="#cc. Donner and women
Alasdair Alexander (Dunfermline, Scotland) writes that he
has been entertained by the views on women and chess in
Donner’s The King (Alkmaar, 2006), e.g. the
articles on pages 92-94, 151-152, 162-164, 256-257 and
278-280. Our correspondent quotes a line from page 280, at
the end of an annotated game from the 1978 Dutch women’s
championship:
‘A game as the one above can only be understood against
the gigglingly nervous background – “we’re only girls,
you know” – of women’s chess. It ought to be abolished.’
In the article on pages 162-164 Donner discussed the
reaction to his view that ‘women cannot play chess’ (which
he had expressed on the grounds, inter alia, ‘that
women are much more stupid than men. And because they are
much more stupid, they lack the ability to amuse
themselves’):
‘I was even accused of racial discrimination. “Donner
forgot to add blacks to his statement. It should read
‘women and blacks cannot play chess, because they are
more stupid than we are’”, was foisted upon me by a lady
of Amsterdam. This lady misunderstood. Black men can
play chess all right, black women cannot. That is the
whole point.’
That article was written in 1972. Mr Alexander observes
that Donner adopted a different tone on pages 256-257 when
writing about Nona Gaprindashvili after her performance at
Lone Pine, 1977:
‘An unprecedented success for the women’s world
champion and a severe blow for all those who, in the
face of the rising mudslide of feminism, thought they
had a final foothold in the conviction that women at
least cannot play chess.
... There is no denying it any more: notions as to
women’s physical or mental deficiency are as of now no
longer based on fact. Even in the field of chess, there
is at least one woman who rates as a world-class player.
For inveterate masculinists and for those who must write
jocular pieces to earn a living, this is a serious
setback, which will naturally not prevent us in the
least, for that matter, from continuing our courageous
struggle unabatedly.’
color="#cc. Copying by Christian Hesse (C.N.
In 1899 George Alcock MacDonnell died, a fact which did
not prevent Christian Hesse from stating in a ChessBase
article that MacDonnell lost a game to Amos Burn in 1910
(see C.N. 8276). On page 183 of The Joys of Chess
(Alkmaar, 2011) Hesse had been vaguer and therefore closer
to the truth, White being identified only as ‘MacDonald’.
He was Edmund E. Macdonald. (See, for instance, our
feature article .)
In 1900 Wilhelm/William Steinitz died, a fact which did
not prevent Christian Hesse from quoting a remark by
Steinitz about a mate-in-two problem by Pulitzer which,
according to Hesse, was dated 1907. (See page 166 of The
of Chess.) Hesse miscopied from our presentation of
the Pulitzer problem on page 11 of A Chess Omnibus
(also included in ). We gave Steinitz’s comments
on the composition as quoted on page 60 of the Chess
Player’s Scrap Book, April 1907, and that sufficed
for Hesse to assume that the problem was composed in 1907.
evidence in favour of 1874, rather than 1878, but further
investigation is required.
color="#cc. Pointed out by Pillsbury
Black to move
What did Pillsbury point out when the game was over?
Notes Archives
Copyright: Edward Winter. All
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