A Tale of Two Titans

November 1972

     It was the best of matches, it was the worst of matches; it was a chess lover's dream, yet hovering on the brink of nightmare; it was a feast of exciting chess, it disappointed the connoisseur. It was a match in which the supreme individualist confounded the collective intelligence of the Soviet "team," in which the King's-pawn player par excellence emerged as a Queen's Gambiteer and won, in which the challenger famed for sharp and deadly play and 6-0 shutouts coasted to victory with a stretch of seven draws. It was a historic necessity that almost neglected to happen. It was jeopardized by one man's demands for money, yet in a preliminary draft of an apology statement he renounced the entire purse and offered to play for the love of chess alone."
     In short, it was the heyday of Fischer, the man of paradox, and a match difficult to comprehend. On Bobby Fischer, the best chess analysts disagreed, professional and amateur psychologists expended thousands of useless words; for him, holders of capital at last released it on a stunned chess world, and the U.S. press rewarded chess with attention as massive (and as superficial) as the coverage of any major sport.
     For it was a revolution. And in revolutions regimes crumble, values are transformed, the unthinkable of yesterday becomes today's routine, the young do outrageous things and the old make all too painful adjustments. All this because the Soviet chess colossus had at last to release its grip on Caissa's most coveted crown to a brash outsider, Fischer, who violated the established order. After a quarter-century their monopoly was breached.
     The Soviet system had done much for chess. We Americans, whose land once approached a chessic wilderness, must honor that other country whose man-in-the-street feels for Mikhail Tal as we do for Willy Mays, which registered over three million players, which has schools for chess and a "school" which turned out strong contenders by systematic tutelage, economic support and training that we never offered our best young talents. (Ours ended as salesmen, doctors and bricklayers, never encouraged by a grandmaster, condemned forever to the purgatory of the weekend Swiss.)
     Chess to us is a game, a great game, even an art—but to the Soviet bureaucrats it was also a badge of superiority over the bourgeois world, another contest of systems in which their players would inevitably prevail because the Soviet system was better, a reflection of the culture they called "socialist." In rigid ideology lie fatal traps, and a big trap snapped shut toward the end of the match when they made the (probably Moscow-approved) charge against the Americans that we were using "electronic devices and a chemical substance" on Spassky. The result was only hilarious ridicule and a vast loss of good will that their exemplary champion had won from an international public. (A solemn scientific search detected two dead flies In a light fixture but there was a news blackout on the cause of death.) Who was paranoid now? There was a grotesque symmetry to Fischer's far more plausible charge of a decade earlier: "The Russians Have Fixed World Chess."
     Now let's have a look at the champion who, willy-nilly, had to represent that system with all its positive and negative aspects.

A Champion of Grace and Humanity

      Think of Boris Spassky, World Chess Champion 1969-72. Consider his stature and his spirit, this man of Russian soul whom Fischer several years ago included in a list of the ten greatest players of all time. (Staunton was also included, but—scandal!—not Lasker nor Botvinnik).
     Spassky, born in Leningrad in 1937, was early discovered by Soviet chess tutors and nurtured into mastery. At age 16 officials accorded him the great privilege of placing him in an international event, and he beat Smyslov in Bucharest. Already at 19 he qualified for the Candidates' Tournament where he tied for third place. But in the next two cycles he was to taste the bitterness of hopes denied—he failed to qualify. (After one unlucky loss to Tal, he wept in the street.)
     Then in 1964 Spassky tied for first in the Interzonal at Amsterdam, and resumed a Herculean struggle for the world crown. In its course, until 1969, he fought no less than eight matches with some of the world's strongest players—and won all but one, the 1966 match with Petrosian! By modifying his strategic psychology, he became world champion in the 1969 rematch, returning to the open, aggressive style natural to him. (When recently asked about the role of his second, Grandmaster Krogius, who is a psychologist by profession, Spassky said: "He tells us homely platitudes and we listen in rap attention.")
     Despite heroic deeds, Spassky, the man, is devoid of egotism. His statements reveal only magnanimity and a balanced approach to life. He has said he would rather enjoy an evening with friends, wine and chess than be world champion. He has also been called "lazy"—as if becoming the champ could engage less than a man's entire energy.
     A poor candidate for conformist in the Soviet scheme of things, Spassky has been no pet of officialdom. After his reported criticism of the invasion of Czechoslovakia, he was absent from the international scene. And he showed forebearance and understanding for Fischer while the Soviet press was roundly condemning the American. What egotistic champion of old would have made Spassky's gesture in joining the applause for Fischer after the sixth game?
     The loss of the match caused discomfort in Moscow and—perhaps more important as chess makes new inroads into the public consciousness—broken hearts in some Icelandic girls (how attractive are those Viking daughters!) who watched the great match. The people who predicted Spassky's defection to the West did not reckon with that special Russian love for a land and people who have contributed so much to the human heritage of artistry, achievement and suffering.
     How did Spassky perform in this vexing, exciting and frightening match? It seemed at the same time a war of nerves, a battle of friendly antagonists, an overwhelming rout (the start), and a tight, even battle (the finish). More than once the side issues loomed more important than the fight on the chess board, and threatened to extinguish it. Spassky said, and experts on the scene confirmed, that the strange events at the start upset his sporting equilibrium. Clearly, his form in the first half was mostly unrecognizable. In game five he committed one of the worst blunders of his career.
     Yet, while many pundits were writing him off, those who know Spassky awaited the return of the grand play, by turns subtle and aggressive, that had made him the champ. He was no weak sister who crumbled after defeat. And, with a devastating victory in game 11, he signaled his return to what became virtually an even struggle.
     At a post-match press conference, the dethroned champion had only kind words for his opponent. Of the "electronic" charge, he simply said he had felt abnormal after an hour of play, without ideas or energy. He credited Fischer's superior play but said that he knew Bobby's weaknesses and would welcome a rematch, at which he would do better if his wife Larissa were with him throughout (she had joined him late in Reykjavik—was this a message to Moscow?).

Exit a most gracious and human champion.

The Real Fischer and the Media Creation

     Now that even the general public has been sated with facts, opinions and half-truths about Bobby Fischer and the match, it is necessary to clarify some and correct others. More investigative journalism and fewer shallow accounts were needed. This writer chanced to be with Fischer on a strictly friendly basis during the crucial few days before his departure for Iceland. One who would understand why the match was under a cloud should first look at the background.
     Bobby Fischer's career has been the antithesis of the life of a talented player nurtured under the Soviet system, with its emphasis on the "collective." Hailed at age 12 as a prodigy, he forsook a conventional adolescence to devote himself to learning chess, essentially alone, his childhood mentors left behind. After age 18, he lived and traveled alone and made his own way, very much in the American tradition of the rugged individualist. His circumstances were modest and he was no special darling of the New York patrons. Bobby Fischer, self-reliant, sensed his destiny and would make it on his own. He also developed rigorous requirements for optimal playing conditions. (These made him unpopular with some organizers, but fellow professionals thanked him.) And so Bobby Fischer personified the old American values while, paradoxically, he pursued a game somehow alien to our society.
     The great Steinitz had died in poverty. Schlechter had starved to death. Even today, the best talents outside of the "socialist" countries are faced with insecurity, usually forced to pursue other occupations. But Fischer sensed that chess is an art, chess is important, he deemed it worthy of all-consuming attention of a genius. The rewards should be commensurate! Why should a Fischer deserve less than a Muhammad Ali? (Let's leave aside the question if anyone deserves that much.)
     Bobby had sacrificed much for chess and borne indignities. On the eve of the match that would bring him (a decade late, he felt) the title, he wanted the greater part of the proceeds to go to him (and to Spassky) and not to entrepreneurs and organizers. After all, who was it that played beautiful chess and made it all possible?
     Fischer was the only superstar without a paid agent, lawyer, public relations man. He trusted no one to make his decisions and neglected the expertise of some who could have helped. After the setback of the "fixed" candidates' event at Curacao in 1962 ("I had the best score of anyone who didn't cheat"), he withdrew from world championship competition for several years. He walked out of the 1967 Sousse Interzonal in another scheduling dispute.
     To Ed Edmondson of the USCF belongs most of the credit for Fischer's reappearance in world championship competition in 1970. As manager, companion and foil for Bobby's chess board preparations, he shepherded Fischer through the Petrosian match in Buenos Aires. But then Bobby went his own way. He disliked the handling of negotiations for the title match. He had his own ideas about the site and the purse (they scoffed when he first named a $50,000 minimum).
     Fischer traveled to Amsterdam to negotiate with a Spassky who didn't appear. (He later told the press: "If Spassky were not a Russian citizen, we'd probably be friends.") He progressively felt that his interests were being subordinated to FIDE's considerations of global chess politics. He wanted to play in Belgrade, the highest bidder at $152,000. Spassky wanted Iceland because of its cooler climate. (Bobby thought the Russians wanted their loss hidden away in that remote island.) After FIDE's Solomon-like decision to split the venue, the Yugoslavs got cold feet and the entire match was at last awarded to a site that had not even been among Fischer's top four preferences. Later an Icelandic chess official bungled his debut in psychological warfare, calling Fischer in print a "coward" who had already in effect "forfeited the match."
     In the last several weeks before the scheduled starting date, Fischer, without an authorized representative, became isolated. At a New York resort he looked at Spassky's games and waited. No one sat down to negotiate a contract with him, and his only "agreement" was a cable sent for him: Fischer will play "under protest."
     In Bobby Fischer there is a rare, unbending kind of integrity and a conviction of his own rightness. He will be liked by those who prize honesty over diplomacy. ("Before, they used to call me arrogant and conceited. Now that I've won all these matches, they've stopped. It's just an obvious fact that I'm the best.")
     To Fischer, his status as the world's best was self-evident to all, match or no match. And so he made his terms difficult for those (unwanted) organizers to meet—in the end, too difficult. I can testify that he evinced no fear at all of Spassky. His opponent in the "war of nerves" was the Icelandic Chess Federation. Perhaps they somehow symbolized to him all the insensitive organizers of the past who had dictated terms for top stars. They were to gain tremendously by his very presence—as one businessman remarked, "This match is a headache but it's worth to us millions in publicity."
     The 200,000 people of Iceland love the royal game—chess even appears in an ancient saga. But that rugged isle was ill-prepared for Bobby Fischer and the barrage of high-powered lawyers and entrepreneurs. In the end, putting business before history, they turned down Fischer's demand for 30% of the gate.
     When Bobby failed to show up for the opening ceremonies on July 1, all Iceland was in turmoil. The Americans there (Fischer's aide Fred Cramer and lawyer Andrew Davis) desperately asked for a postponement, citing "fatigue." A cable from a physician was reported to be forthcoming, but did not exist. Back in New York, Bobby sat up late with friends before the scheduled opening of history's most keenly-awaited chess match, a picture of calm. To them, the situation was unreal. One fought to resist being overcome by a gathering feeling of historic tragedy. All appeared hopeless.

Enter Deus Ex Machina

     In London, the Sunday press called Fischer a chicken: That was too much for one James Slater, a British financier whose action lent support to the anarchic theory that holds history to be a logicless result of fortuitous events. Slater announced that he was personally doubling the $125,000 purse! A certain Kissinger from the White House phoned—he would call again in a later crisis. Fischer at last decided to play, and flew to Iceland in time to start the match two days late. Single-handedly, he had put chess in the big time.

Potential Becomes Act

     Many new problems would plague the match, now that Fischer's monetary demands were resolved. FIDE President Euwe admitted in effect that his two-day postponement of the first game was a technical error but a tactical necessity, while the Russians asked that the first game be forfeited in "punishment" (as of a child). When Fischer missed the ceremony for the drawing of colors, sending instead his second, Lombardy, it was time for the Soviets to step up their counter-offensive. Spassky walked out, demanding Fischer's apology. (An Icelandic journalist wrote that Moscow had ordered him home in protest and that he refused on the grounds of sportsmanship. Others pointed out Spassky's advantage if Fischer played one or two games and only then withdrew: there would then be no substitute challenger appointed.) Meanwhile, some hilarious "news" arrived from Moscow: Fischer was to receive help during the game from a computer in New York!
     Fischer, thrown on the defensive, produced a most contrite apology indeed, citing "my disrespectful behavior." He apologized to Spassky, Euwe, the organizers and to "millions" of fans.
     The next Soviet attempt to equalize psychologically was to keep Fischer waiting. The match at last began on July 11, 1972, nine days late.
     Game one was disastrous for Fischer. In a simple, drawn ending, he gave away a Bishop—the most incredible blunder of his career. Why? One theory held that he was disturbed by the TV cameras; another, that he moved impulsively, annoyed at his opponent's failure to offer a draw; that the move represented a suicide wish; that he miscalculated due to over-confidence; that he craved a 13-0 shutout.
     Bobby Fischer, who has an acute sense of hearing, had no objection to the closed-circuit cameras, but was adamantly opposed to the TV crews of Chester Fox, Inc., and the American Broadcasting Company. The Icelandic Chess Federation had an agreement and would not give in, even as Fischer's clock was started for game two, "forcing" him to cooperate. (Their memory was short. Surely they knew that, in the Reshevsky match of 1961, Fischer could not be coerced and refused to continue after a forfeit. A forfeited game is an absurdity in a two-man match.) Bobby (of course) held his ground, and when the offer was made to remove the cameras, if only he would come to the hall, he assented only if the Iost time on his clock were erased. The German referee, Lothar Schmid, could not do anything so unorthodox. The game was forfeited! And a committee upheld Schmid's decision.
     Who could expect Bobby to accept a forfeit and continue the match two points down? The match, in its second major crisis, appeared again a lost cause. Then came cables of encouragement from home, a USCF promise to fight the decision later at the FIDE Congress, and long talks with friends, including Lena Grumette of Los Angeles, who had long taken a maternal interest in Bobby's welfare.

The Match Gains Momentum—
Chess Comes to the Fore

     Salvation was found again, with the crucial help of another Fischer lawyer, Paul Marshall. Bobby showed up for game three, granted the concession that it be played in a private room, to which Boris agreed. (Also, there were street noises, and Spassky, early in the game, balked and wanted to move back to the stage. Schmid's persuasion is credited with saving the day.) With an innovation in the sharp Benoni Defense, Fischer defeated Spassky for the first time in his career, and signalled that he was back in contention.

     And what a comeback it was! In games 3 through 10 Fischer amassed 61/2 points out of a possible 8, the most one-sided streak since Lasker mowed down Janowski in 1910. Surely Fischer played superbly in that stretch. The artistic gem of the whole match was the sixth game, which Fischer began with a big surprise-1 P-QB4, leading, for the first time in his life, to the Queen's Gambit Declined. (His favorite 1 P-K4 and Leonhardt-Sozin Attack had run into trouble in game 4 vs. Soviet prepared analysis—was he improvising?) He went on to win a game of Capablanca-like economy and simplicity from the stunned champion. It was too early to decide if Fischer had used a superb psychological tactic or rather parted with his favorite weapon in a capitulation to Soviet analysts. This first time it worked perfectly, and he seized the lead in the match. But when he later returned "left of center," the games were uninspired. He caught Spassky off guard with a harmless-looking innovation in game 8, but by game 14 Spassky was on familiar terrain and Bobby appeared to be swimming in those strange waters of the Queen's Gambit Declined and blundered a pawn. (Six moves later Spassky blundered it back, turning his face to the wall in disgust.)
     Defending against the QP, Fischer invariably equalized with ease, playing nearly everything but his favorite King's Indian/Gruenfeld. (Must we now regard the Exchange Variation as too strong? Bobby and Boris obviously know something about it that the rest of us may never see.) The frequency of Fischer's original ideas in the match, considering that researches were essentially unaided, was marvelous.
     But on the territory of the Sicilian, Spassky and his team must be credited with rebuffing Fischer's most familiar lines with either color, pushing him into adopting different variations, like the Richter-Rauzer Attack and Alekhine's Defense. The poisoned pawn of the 11th game proved more venemous than ever. (It was played during an interlude of relative peace in Reykjavik—fueling the theorists who claim that Bobby plays worse when protesting least.) The only Sicilian in which Fischer shone was in game 21, when he played the Paulsen Variation for the first time, innovated on move 7, and magically converted to an endgame position characteristic of the Scotch Opening.
     If game 3 put Fischer back in the match, game 13 put Spassky out of it. That game was the most interesting battle of all. Spassky was surprised by Alekhine's Defense, lost a pawn early but developed dangerous Kingside pressure that he misplayed, pressed for time. (Such repeated surprises were giving him an unaccustomed clock problem, whereas Fischer usually finished his games with twenty minutes to spare.) At adjournment Fischer had what seemed like a winning endgame. Yet Spassky found a perfect defense against ingenious threats, only to throw away the draw just before the third time-control. Such a defeat is especially painful, and gave Fischer a virtually insurmountable lead of three points.
     Bobby Fischer now had six outright wins, a criterion he had long ago recommended for deciding a chess match. He seemed to slacken his effort, to relax a bit, for the remainder —except for increasingly strident complaints about spectator noise, demanding the removal of the front row and even threatening once to walk out. The next seven games were all drawn, as Spassky repeatedly took a slight initiative that proved insufficient to win. Finally, in game 21, all hope gone, he threw away an even ending and didn't even bother to play off the adjourned position.
     Thus Bobby Fischer found out by phone that he was the eleventh chess champion of the world. He took the news calmly. It merely made official a destiny he had sensed as a boy in Brooklyn many years ago.
The final score of 12½ -8½ (or 12½ -7½ without the forfeit) was the most lopsided since the Tal-Botvinnik encounters of 1960-61, yet far less so than in Fischer's 1971 matches. Spassky clearly remains the biggest threat to Fischer's crown.
     At the closing banquet, Bobby Fischer mixed old and new, dancing with an Icelandic girl and burying himself in a pocket chess set during the FIDE president's speech. Before returning to a cold reception in Moscow, Boris Spassky told the press: "Fischer is a man of art but he is a rare human being in the everyday life of this century. I like Fischer and I think that I understand him."

The Dawn of a New Era

     From an artistic viewpoint, it was a spotty match that had its moments. It was far more interesting psychologically than artistically. There was just too much happening away from the board. A chess lover cannot expect the best when the key question becomes not which move will be made, but whether a game will be played at all. These are two players who represent better than anyone else the long chessic heritage of knowledge, artistry and technique, wedded to consummate dedication. It is fourteen centuries since the invention of chess, five centuries since the emergence of the modern game, a century since the introduction of scientific thinking. Today Fischer stands at the pinnacle, regarded by many as the strongest player that ever lived.
     Rumors have already begun of a rematch, something devoutly to be wished. Let it not again be arranged as if Bobby Fischer had materialized overnight as a great chess player with unusual requirements. Fischer has been playing prfessional chess for over a decade. He is basically the same person and remains a man of rare principle. Those who would organize the next match should include face-to-face discussions with Fischer before concluding negotiations of a contract well in advance. They should have him personally inspect the physical conditions, including the complications introduced by TV cameras. (Why has no one designed a soundproof transparent partition to be placed in front of the stage?) Fischer wants to defend his title more frequently than FIDE rules dictate. Let the same mistakes not be repeated.
     In conclusion, we must thank Bobby Fischer for the marvelous surge of interest in chess in our country, and welcome a new era in American chess with fresh vision.
     We have all witnessed the change—people playing chess on trains, in bars, on their lunch-breaks as never before, books selling out, the USCF inundated with thousands of new membership applications. Long-time workers in the chess vineyards are beginning to see their devotion bear fruit, and profit-minded outsiders are hatching promotional schemes. There is talk of a national chess league, each team to be captained by a grandmaster. Shelby Lyman, whose TV program on the match was watched by millions, gained such popularity that he is said to be on the way to affluence (even as offers to Fischer were reported to total $10 million).
     Why don't chess clubs around the country (both old and newly-organized) initiate outreach programs in their areas, especially to schools and industries? Such a movement could sustain and solidify the current craze. I am thinking of classes, exhibitions, tournaments, recruitment of members.
     Out there somewhere in Iowa or Georgia are potential major talents waiting to be nurtured—maybe one of those little boys (or girls!) you see opening their games with the KRP. Some day one of them may sit down and seriously think of how to beat Fischer.
     Thus, in 1972, Bobby Fischer may have sown the seeds of his own eclipse—but in how many decades?