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Young World
His last move
P. K. AJITH KUMAR
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With the passing of Bobby Fisher, chess has lost a champ.
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Photo: AFP
At play: Bobby Fisher (R) and Soviet Tigran Petrossian.
Bobby Fischer made his last move on January 18. Fischer, who died at a hospital in the Icelandic capital of Reykjavik following a serious illness, was the man who turned chess into a global sport from a favourite hobby of the erstwhile Soviet Union. He was one of the greatest — and most contr
oversial — figures of the sporting world.
He had rare talent, the kind which the world sees but once. He brought about a revolution in chess. Would have been played in every corner of the world if the maverick American hadn’t taken on the mighty Russians? And won. His 1972 World championship match against Boris Spassky in Reykjavik brought chess to centre stage.
Inspiration
Many grandmasters, from different parts of the globe, have mentioned that he was the inspiration for their game. The phenomenal interest generated by his match with Spassky, the heated battle between an American and Russian in Iceland at the height of the cold war made front page news, not just in the U.S., but the world over.
In Reykjavik, Fischer brought an end to the Soviet domination of chess that began with Alexander Alekhine (who became a naturalised French citizen) in 1927. Till Fischer’s crowning in 1972, only for two years did chess have a non-Soviet World champion (Max Euwe of Netherlands was the champion from 1935 to 1937).
Fischer was scheduled to meet his challenger Anatoly Karpov of Russia in the 1975 World championship match, but he refused to play and forfeited the title. He went on a self-imposed exile and resurfaced only in 1992 to play his old foe Spassky one more time, in Yugoslavia. He won the match, and never played another competitive game. His games, though, continue to delight millions of chess fans across the world.
The chess world would always remember him with a sense of incredulousness. And gratitude.
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