The Tragic Downfall of Bobby Fischer

If someone asked you, can chess take a toll on your mental health, or at the very least, can it be damaging to you, who would you use as an example? I'm sure that a lot of you will bring up chess legend Bobby Fischer. Once a world renown chess grandmaster, by some even considered the GOAT of chess, things quickly took a turn for the worst for the chess mastermind. Today I'll be talking about what happened to Fischer.

Childhood

I felt like it'd be wrong to not mention Fischer's childhood, because it is a big part of who he became. Bobby Fischer grew up in Chicago, IL, and learned chess at the age of 6. The young Bobby grew up without a father with his mother and older sister. It was his sister who sparked his love for the game of chess, after one day she brought home an old, rusted down chess set.

Bobby became a National Master at the age of 12, proceeding to win the American Junior Chess Championship, being the youngest to do so. At age 14, Fischer won the U.S. championship, giving him the title of International Master. At this point, Fischer was already widely considered a "chess genius," and many people knew that he had great things to come in the chess world.

The Game Of The Century (just shown) was where Fischer's carrier really kicked off. It was pretty obvious that Bobby was planning on pursuing chess for a lifetime, as he dropped out of high school at 16. Things were looking great for the young master, and everyone was excited to see what he was capable of. Unfortunately, that wasn't necessarily the case...

Chess Career

As the audience grew bigger, so did the pressure. Chess fans from all over the world were now tuning in on Fischer's success. It's pretty obvious that this affected him in one way or another. One of the biggest reasons of Fischer's insanity was the ongoing Cold War. Because Fischer was the best American chess player, he quickly became a massive representative of the US. He would have to, against his will, face off against the world champion, a soviet, Boriss Spassky, to see who the real king of chess is. I partially covered this in one of my other blogs.

Although it was obvious that Fischer was going to face Boris Spassky in the World Championship, he still needed to perform well in the Palma de Mallorca tournament to earn his place. Bobby did incredible, scoring 18.5 points out of 23, winning 1st place by a mile. 

Fischer continued his legacy by miraculously winning the world championship, in a tough battle. You can find more info about that in this detailed article. 

After the win, Fischer's play died down a little. Chess players/fans were still congratulating him on his victory, but he was no longer taking the game that seriously. His goal was to show that world what he was capable of by becoming the world champion, and he had achieved it.

What happened to Bobby Fischer?

Now that we looked over Fischer's childhood and career, let's look at why he went insane. One of the obvious factors of his fall was the pressure put on him by the US and the Soviet Union. If he lost the match, he would become a 'disgrace' to America, and could even be publicly shamed for his failure. A good example of this is sort of what happened to Spassky after his loss.

The addictive aspect of chess also got to him. Non-stop chess for years could really take a toll on your mental health, especially under not-so-great circumstances. 

Fischer also had a great sense of paranoia within him, as demonstrated during the follow-up world championship match. Fischer had felt that the rules for the match were unreasonable, so he decided to make his own set regulations. This, off course, was denied, as the rules were clearly unfair, and favored one party over the other.

All in all, Fischer's fame and chess-obsession really got to him. After the world championship match, his behavior got worse, and so did his mental health. Even though all of this bad stuff happened to Fischer, a lot of people can agree that he is still one of the best players of all time, and maybe even the GOAT. I'm trying to become a Top Blogger right now, so any support and feedback would be appreciated. I'm also trying to blog more often, so you can be ready for that. Anyways, that's it for now, I hope that you learned something new today or at least enjoyed reading this. Adios.