Media comments on chess

[JustinHorton]

The article begins:

One day a number of years ago, I was deep into a game of draughts on holiday with my daughter, then almost four, in the small library of a beachfront town. Her eye drifted to a nearby table, where a black-and-white board bristled with far more interesting figures (many a future chess master has been innocently drawn in by “horses” and “castles”).

“What’s that?” she asked. “Chess,” I replied. “Can we play?” she pleaded. I nodded absently.

There was just one problem: I didn’t know how. I dimly remembered having learned the basic moves as a kid, but chess had never stuck. This fact vaguely haunted me through my life. I would see an idle board in a hotel lobby or a puzzle in a weekend newspaper supplement, and feel a pang.

I had picked up a general awareness of chess. I knew the names Bobby Fischer and Garry Kasparov. I knew that the game had enchanted historical luminaries including Marcel Duchamp and Vladimir Nabokov. I knew the cliche about grandmasters being able to look a dozen moves ahead. I knew that chess, like classical music, was shorthand in movies for genius – often of the evil variety. But I knew chess the way I “knew” the Japanese language: what it looks like, what it sounds like, its Japaneseness, without actually comprehending it.

I decided to learn the game, if only to be able to teach my daughter.

It took a few hours, hunched over my smartphone at kids’ birthday parties or waiting in line at Trader Joe’s, to get a feel for the basic moves

This is very dfferent to the same writer's piece in Nautilus and The Week five years ago which began thus:

My 4-year-old daughter and I were deep in a game of checkers one day about three years ago when her eye drifted to a nearby table. There, a black-and-white board bristled with far more interesting figures, like horses and castles. "What's that?" she asked. "Chess," I replied. "Can we play?" she asked. I nodded absently.

There was just one problem: I didn't know how. I dimly remembered having learned the basic moves in elementary school, but it never stuck. This fact vaguely haunted me through my life; idle chessboards in hotel lobbies or puzzles in weekend newspaper supplements teased me like reproachful riddles.

And so I decided I would learn, if only so I could teach my daughter. The basic moves were easy enough to pick up — a few hours hunched over my smartphone at kids' birthday parties or waiting in line at the grocery store.

[Roland Kensdale]

University Challenge Xmas 2020 series episode 4. No-one could identify the word in chess for the the same piece attacking 2 or more enemy pieces at once.

No Oxbridge representation I hope.

(https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000qry7 ) Nottingham v Sheffield. Older alumni. I recognised Michael Deacon who writes entertainingly in the Telegraph and a news reader.

Some of them must have played a casual game but never interested enough to look at a chess book. Like 99.9% of people who have played I expect.

[NickFaulks]

Older alumni.

Ah, celebs. You would hope that four undergrads chosen for their knowledge would do better.

[Kevin Thurlow]

If only we could travel

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/a ... iling.html

[Martin Benjamin]

Very nice clip from 1966, but who is Jonathan?

I'm informed that the little boy with the toffee apple who is playing Martin Bell is Jonathan Christopher Benjamin who passed away in 2000. If it is him, I remember him when I was just starting to play chess and there are games of his on the database. Here's one of him playing Glenn Lambert who was a bit of a legend in Hampshire chess when I was a kid but died in 2003.

[Event "London CC Invitation"] [Site "London"] [Date "1973.09.09"] [Round "4"] [White "Lambert, Glenn EJ"] [Black "Benjamin, John C"] [Result "1/2-1/2"] [ECO "E66"] [PlyCount "100"] [EventDate "1973.09.07"] [EventType "swiss"] [EventRounds "5"] [EventCountry "ENG"] [SourceTitle "EXT 2016"] [Source "ChessBase"] [SourceDate "2015.10.08"] [SourceVersion "1"] [SourceVersionDate "2015.10.08"] [SourceQuality "1"] 1. Nf3 g6 2. d4 Nf6 3. g3 Bg7 4. Bg2 O-O 5. c4 d6 6. O-O Nc6 7. d5 Na5 8. Nfd2 c5 9. Nc3 a6 10. Qc2 Rb8 11. b3 b5 12. Bb2 e6 13. Rab1 bxc4 14. bxc4 Bh6 15. Nce4 Nxe4 16. Nxe4 Rxb2 17. Rxb2 f5 18. Nc3 Nxc4 19. Rb8 Qc7 20. Rxc8 Rxc8 21. dxe6 Nb6 22. a4 a5 23. Rd1 Qe7 24. Rb1 Qc7 25. Qb3 Bg7 26. e7+ c4 27. Qxb6 Qxb6 28. Rxb6 Bxc3 29. Rxd6 Re8 30. Bd5+ Kg7 31. Bxc4 Rxe7 32. e3 Bb4 33. Rd8 Rc7 34. Bb5 Bc3 35. Kg2 Bb4 36. h3 Be1 37. Rd1 Bb4 38. g4 Kf6 39. gxf5 Kxf5 40. Rd4 Re7 41. Bd3+ Kf6 42. Kf3 Re6 43. Kg4 Kg7 44. Bc4 Rd6 45. Rf4 Rf6 46. Rxf6 Kxf6 47. f4 h5+ 48. Kf3 g5 49. e4 gxf4 50. Kxf4 Bd2+ 1/2-1/2

Richard James alerted me to the BBC Archives clip (John Upham had spotted it - my thanks to John and Richard). I was only 3 at the time, so I don't remember it and had no knowledge of it until now, but although I could not believe it on first viewing, on subsequent viewings it is definitely my late brother Jon. My surviving brothers, cousins and Jon's widow are certain, too. I never saw him with a toffee apple that big, though!

[Gerard Killoran]

Marylebone Mercury - Friday 09 March 1979a.png

Marylebone Mercury - Friday 09 March 1979b.png

[JustinHorton]

Saturn 3

[Geoff Chandler]

That is a wonderful find Gerrard.

Hi Justin,

At least your piece referred to chess actually appearing in a sci-fi film.

I once used:



adding there is a picture of Morphy in it:



It's not, I photo-shopped it. I recently confessed this in my 2010-2020 celebrations of 10 years of doing the Red Hot Pawn Bloggy thing.

https://www.redhotpawn.com/chess-blog/t ... --2020.472

[Kevin Thurlow]

Apparently, Anya Taylor-Joy is on the Graham Norton Show tonight. BBC1 @10.45 pm.

[Paul Robert Jackson]

"From Russia with Love" on ITV 4 tonight.
11 Jan 2021 @ 9:00pm
Chess at the beginning
............real game in Leningrad 1960 between Spassky who plays a Kings Gambit against Bronstein in the USSR Championships.
The only difference is the removal of two pawns on c5 and d4.

[Sean Parker]

Yes that's right.....no need for the Chess Police either the board is legal!
I believe the villain playing the combination was Kronstein or Kronsteen...

[Chris Rice]

Yes that's right.....no need for the Chess Police either the board is legal!
I believe the villain playing the combination was Kronstein or Kronsteen...

Here's the clip and notice how Kronsteen carefully takes a piece with a lighted cigarette in hand.

[Nick Grey]

Changed hand for later move. Still best Chess in a Bond film and a repeat.

[Geoff Chandler]

From Edward Winter's site

Spassky is portrayed as Kronsteen, I thought at first it may too have been a photo-shop joke.
(One I wish I had thought of) but then I remembered how meticulous Mr Winter is. He would have checked.





The link the Winter page on chess stamps is: https://www.chesshistory.com/winter/extra/stamps.html

I wonder if Beth Harman may one day appear on a stamp.

[Stewart Reuben]

Boris Spassky speculated to me, when we were in Gibraltar, about why they removed the two pawns from his game against David Bronstein. He thought it might have been because the film makers otherwise would have feared breach of copyright. Of course we know there is no copyright in chess games.