I am writing a term paper on Soviet domination of chess and have been having a hard time finding good sources- I got everything in my university's library and that's only 5 books, most of which are too old to cover the entire period I'm looking at. Does anyone have some pointers of where I can look to find reputable information? Online is OK so long as it's a reasonable source. Specifically, I'm looking for any reference to the world championship matches Fischer-Spassky, Karpov-Korchnoi, and Karpov-Kasparov in a political (cold-war) context. Any information on the Soviet school of chess and the training programs they used to achieve dominance would also be helpful.

Thanks in advance.

Make sure you at least mention Krylenko:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikolai_Krylenko

Thanks for the input- I was definitely going to devote a fair amount of space to Krylenko. I'll probably end up buying that Russians Versus Fischer book, but my main concern now would be Karpov vs his rivals Korchnoi and Kasparov. I have Korchnoi's and Kasparov's autobiographies and I'm trying to tease some information out of those, but I have to consider that they're biased sources. Also, I have no general information going past the early 60s. The Soviet School of Chess (Kotov), Soviet Chess (Grekov), and Soviet Chess (Richards) are good sources, but only cover the early days.

The book on world champion matches between K-K is with me

Notice the match soviet vs rest of the world. Maby you can find some information somewhere.

What i think is nice about this match, is that Fischer did'nt play first board on the world team, Bent Larsen did!!

http://www.chesshistory.com/winter/

Chess Notes by Edward Winter is very reliable and authoritative. He routinely demolishes old wives tales and urban legends regarding chess masters, chess tnmts, matches etc. There's an internal search engine to look up anything in any of his columns, I'm sure you'll find some useful stuff there.

Andrew Soltis. Soviet Chess 1917-1991.

Genna Sosonko. Russian Silhouettes.

Garry Kasparov. My Great Predecessors. Vol 4. Fischer.

Garry Kasparov. My Great Predecessors. Vol 5. Korchnoi and Karpov.

Garry Kasparov. Garry Kasparov on Modern Chess, Part Two: Kasparov vs Karpov 1975-1985.

Garry Kasparov. Garry Kasparov on Modern Chess, Part Three: Kasparov vs Karpov 1986-1987.

Garry Kasparov. Garry Kasparov on Modern Chess, Part 4: Kasparov vs Karpov 1988-2009.

Wow, massive thread necro.

Thanks for the advice, but I turned in this term paper about two years ago. Got an A on it, too.

If anyone cares, here is my bibliography:

Ludek Pachman.  Checkmate in Prague.

Mikhail Shereshevsky. The Soviet Chess Conveyor.  about training methods.

David Edmonds and John Eidinow. Bobby Fischer Goes to War : How A Lone American Star Defeated the Soviet Chess Machine.

Anatoly Karpov. Karpov on Karpov: Memoirs of a Chess World Champion.

What class was the term paper for?

It was a Soviet History class.

Fezzik: The paper has been written, turned in, graded, and returned. This was a couple years ago.

And there's no way Kasparov would be significantly worse as a source than Kotov & Yudovich, which was mostly a gigantic polemical rant about how much Steinitz and Tarrasch sucked at chess compared to Chigorin.

Besides, with my Russian history interest, I am more than used to dealing with biased sources. I just finished a class on Medieval Russia, and for the first couple centuries almost our only source was a chronicle written by monks and later revised to fit state ideology. And in Soviet-era history, every source you come across has one of the two Cold War agendas. As long as you understand what you're reading and know to account for that bias, it doesn't matter. In fact, the bias itself is very valuable in showing us an inside view.

My best suggestion would be for you to ask Karpov, possibly at:

http://www.facebook.com/anatoly.karpov or

http://www.anatolykarpovchessschool.org/

And certainly our dear chess correspondant right here at chess.com Natalia Pogonina:

http://www.pogonina.com/

Just go to the contact us link on the home page left bar navigation.

Karpov a Russian experienced chess player and Nat a new fresh look on the history of her country perhaps.

I am sure that you have read this site from wiki:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russia_(USSR)_vs_Rest_of_the_World

Another source would be Garry Kasparov if you can contact him:

Only source I could find is:

http://www.speakersassociates.com/Garry%20Kasparov.html

Additionally just do some research on the internet, Fischer Spassky match for instace brings a lot of returns, you just have to use yoyr imagination to get good results.

1. Fisher Spasski the cold war game:

http://www.bobby-fischer.net/match_of_the_century.htm

 2. Fischer against the world:

http://nsarchive.wordpress.com/2011/01/11/bobby-fischer-the-cia-and-the-kgb/

3.Wiki:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Fischer

Karpoc vs Korchoi:

http://www.google.ca/search?hl=en&q=karpov+korchoi+games+&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=

Karpov vs Kasparov:

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/05/18/chesspotism

http://classic.battle.net/diablo2exp/classes/necromancer.shtml