Nice 74

[Paul Cooksey]

Custom and practice

also possibly Chessbase, who appear to sometimes transcribe the same name differently deliberately.

I'm not really qualified to comment on the translation of Kieseritzky, so happy to take Chris's word that it something that can at least be reasonably argued not to be a mistake. I think it is an exception though, I don't see much doubt that there are a lot of errors in GM Keene's writing which tend to be repeated.

To save Justin the trouble of pointing out I am speculating without any knowledge, I do indeed have no knowledge of how GM Keene works and am going to speculate anyway. I have spoken to a couple of chess authors who have a base set of files. It seems a bit indiscreet to name him, but I know a GM who wrote a well reviewed opening book very quickly indeed after agreeing the contract. Essentially he had all the analysis in advance and was only really preparing it for the typesetter.

Maybe GM Keene has such base files. So reused content is not exactly copied from book to book, but rather books copied from the same source which remains wrong. It raises a question of why he doesn't bother to correct it. It seems unlikely he is unaware of the relevant chessnotes for example, given he is interactive online with some people with whom he enjoys friendly relations, It doesn't seem like it would take much time or effort, particularly if you have access to willing flunkies. Puzzling.

[Chris Goodall]

Anyone who tries to defend Ray Keene (in the face of all the evidence) does nothing for his reputation, they only damage their own credibility.

That's great, except that most grown-ups will find you less credible for coming out and saying "I don't believe you because you defended Ray Keene" than for defending Ray Keene in the first place, so the credibility scorekeepers end up just sulking to themselves in a corner.

[JustinHorton]

Maybe GM Keene has such base files. So reused content is not exactly copied from book to book, but rather books copied from the same source which remains wrong.

This looks generally right to me, though I assume (because often little alterations are made) that a note is kept of previous appearances.

As it goes, I know that at least one file of many of Ray's past annotations exists, because I'm in possession of one.

[Matt Mackenzie]

One is reminded of the many various spellings of Korchnoi - despite that, that particular one is now generally "agreed" in English.

[Chris Goodall]

One is reminded of the many various spellings of Korchnoi - despite that, that particular one is now generally "agreed" in English.

It's a good point, if custom and practice feels strongly that -ой is spelt -oy, and less strongly that Корчной is spelt Korchnoi, which custom and practice do you follow?

[John Townsend]

Chris Goodall says Kieseritsky is "barely even a misspelling", but I can't see that that has been established.

I see In the text that Olimpiu referred to above (viewtopic.php?f=2&t=10047&p=231012#p231012) a defender of Keene (Jimmy Adams), accepted, two years ago, that "Kieseritsky" was a misspelling and remarked that Keene knew perfectly well how to spell the name (i.e. that "Kieseritzky" was correct).

[ben.graff]

One is reminded of the many various spellings of Korchnoi - despite that, that particular one is now generally "agreed" in English.

Korchnoi is an interesting case in point, in that he adopted different spellings at different times in his life. Genna Sosonko wrote in "Evil-Doer" about the change Korchnoi made when he came to the West.

"However, before setting off on the warpath, he needed to choose a new surname in the Latin alphabet, deprived as he was of his birth surname in the Cyrillic alphabet. Viktor rejected the English spelling "Korchnoi", and chose neither the German not the French versions, instead settling on a mixture of all three. Although all sorts of versions of his surname exist on chess and other websites, he wrote his surname in his new passport as "Kortchnoi", and he retained this version for the last forty years of his life."

Sosonko notes that it is also Kortchnoi on his gravestone. It which makes you wonder why the "accepted" spelling is not the one "Korchnoi" actually chose. A rare case no doubt, but it does show how multiple spellings can come about.

[JustinHorton]

One is reminded of the many various spellings of Korchnoi - despite that, that particular one is now generally "agreed" in English.

Well yes, but these things do settle down as it were.

The rendering of foreign names, and their transliteration from non-Latin scripts, is hardly a new problem in English literature of various kinds. There may be no hard-and-fast rules, there are always going to be terms that are contested and long-accepted versions which for one reason or another find themselves giving way to others, but in general there's a reason why we have dictionaries and why we are all, when writing here, endeavouring to employ standard accepted English spellings. And while there may be all kinds of good reasons to depart from that, provided we know why we are doing so, the carelessness and indolence of lazy former chess correspondents do not convincingly register as "good".

[O.G. Urcan]

Last week, Edward Winter's feature article on Harry Golombek quoted an assertion by Raymond Keene about Harry Golombek's higher education:

Golombek enjoyed a superlative gift for conveying the drama of battles on the chessboard, elevating chess commentary to the literary level of the Icelandic epic sagas which he had studied for his Doctorate.

Those words are on page 422 of the July 2019 BCM, and are reproduced on page 214 of Fifty Shades of Ray, but what is the factual basis for the "Doctorate" statement?

Many thanks in advance for any information.

O.G. Urcan

[Gerard Killoran]

Anyone who tries to defend Ray Keene (in the face of all the evidence) does nothing for his reputation, they only damage their own credibility.

That's great, except that most grown-ups will find you less credible for coming out and saying "I don't believe you because you defended Ray Keene" than for defending Ray Keene in the first place, so the credibility scorekeepers end up just sulking to themselves in a corner.

Grown-ups indeed!

[Tim Harding]

One is reminded of the many various spellings of Korchnoi - despite that, that particular one is now generally "agreed" in English.

Korchnoi is an interesting case in point, in that he adopted different spellings at different times in his life. Genna Sosonko wrote in "Evil-Doer" about the change Korchnoi made when he came to the West.

"However, before setting off on the warpath, he needed to choose a new surname in the Latin alphabet, deprived as he was of his birth surname in the Cyrillic alphabet. Viktor rejected the English spelling "Korchnoi", and chose neither the German not the French versions, instead settling on a mixture of all three. Although all sorts of versions of his surname exist on chess and other websites, he wrote his surname in his new passport as "Kortchnoi", and he retained this version for the last forty years of his life."

Sosonko notes that it is also Kortchnoi on his gravestone. It which makes you wonder why the "accepted" spelling is not the one "Korchnoi" actually chose. A rare case no doubt, but it does show how multiple spellings can come about.

After reading Ben's convincing posting, I have somewhat reluctantly changed "Korchnoi" to "Kortchnoi" in my game database, but I think the answer to his last question is that writers and players of my generation all grew up with "Korchnoi" and may not have read Sosonko's book at all, or until we were too set in our ways.

Moreover, those of us who learnt a little Russian at school (or elsewhere) know that there is no equivalent of the letter t in the cyrillic spelling of Viktor Lvovich's surname and so would tend to resist the "Kortchnoi" version if we weren't aware that this was his personal choice.

Against that, however, I have to admit that there is no letter T at the start of the cyrillic spelling of the great music composer Tchaikovsky's surname either.

(On the other hand, in M. I. Chigorin's lifetime his surname was variously spelled Tchigorin or Tchigorine or Tschigorin in west European and American sources, I think, but "Chigorin" is now accepted. For many years I used to write "Shiffers", on the basis of the transliteration method I was taught in school, but some time ago I abandoned the struggle and write "Schiffers" like everyone else, including himself. Indeed if you look at their signatures on the photos in the Hastings 1895 tournament book you will see the spellings Tchigorine and Schiffers.)

I had at least two reasonably lengthy conversations with Viktor (one before his defection and one after) but the spelling of his name in English never came up, unfortunately for this discussion.

[JustinHorton]

After reading Ben's convincing posting, I have somewhat reluctantly changed "Korchnoi" to "Kortchnoi" in my game database, but I think the answer to his last question is that writers and players of my generation all grew up with "Korchnoi"

How sure are you of that

[Matt Mackenzie]

CHESS magazine changed to the now customary spelling later on IIRC.

[Gerard Killoran]

Fifty Shades of Ray still uses the misspelling "Kieseritsky."

That's barely even a misspelling; the guy was born Лионель Кизерицкий, and the German orthography happened to catch on in Western Europe. The English would have called him Kizeritsky if they'd got to him first. (Don't get me started on "Nepomniachtchi" for Непомнящий.)

Although Kieseritzky was born under the Russian Empire in what is now Estonia, what evidence is there that his family used Cyrillic at home, or even for his christening?

I would think the best argument for using the spelling 'Kieseritzky', is that he used it himself!

From 'Cinquante parties jouées au Cercle des Échecs et au Café de la Régence' By Lionel Adalbert Bagration Felix Kieseritzky

lionel.png

[Geoff Chandler]

What's been going on here.

Me and Justin were having a polite discussion and now I find it's been hi-jacked by all kinds of people.

Korchnoi...don't speak to me about the spelling of Korchnoi. When I first got chessbase it took me
ages to figure out the way they spelt it. 'Kortschnoj'

So what has happened here then, Raymond Keene has misspelt Korchnoi and some are demanding he be horse whipped.

I'll read what has happened and no doubt be back.