Media comments on chess

[Tim Spanton]

October's issue of The Oldie has an explanation of zugzwang from a writer who "collect(s) German portmanteau words."

[Mick Norris]

Chess just featured as an answer in Fighting Talk on Radio 5 live

[Neil Graham]

"I see Sean Bean will be playing Mark Hebden in a new BBC series."

Great spot - I'll leave someone else to greet Mark with "Hello, Mr Bean".

Also Shula's husband in "The Archers". (Killed in a car crash/by a car if I remember correctly)

Mark Hebden in the Archers swerved to avoid Caroline Bone's horse and hit a tree as far as I remember. I don't recall chess ever featuring in The Archers though no doubt someone will correct me.

[Simon Rogers]

Last Sunday, 20th September BBC2 6.30pm to 7pm.
House of Games presented by Richard Osman.
The celebrity contestants (Shaun Keaveny, Jay Blades, Rachel Parris and Jan Ravens) in the penultimate round of the quiz, were each given a tablet to use.
They had to each circle, the starting square for the white queen.
Not all of them got it correct.

[Matt Mackenzie]

Rachel (who I quite like) was the one who went wrong, putting the Queen on the Kings square.

(was quite pleasantly surprised 3 out of 4 got it right tbh)

[Stewart Reuben]

Watching tv Wednesday evening. I wasn't paying much attention during the ads.
There was a Barclay card ad depicting a woman playing chess.

[Mick Norris]

Last Sunday, 20th September BBC2 6.30pm to 7pm.
House of Games presented by Richard Osman.
The celebrity contestants (Shaun Keaveny, Jay Blades, Rachel Parris and Jan Ravens) in the penultimate round of the quiz, were each given a tablet to use.
They had to each circle, the starting square for the white queen.
Not all of them got it correct.

There was a "highbrow" question in last night's edition about which piece was involved in a fianchetto

[Kevin Thurlow]

"There was a Barclay card ad depicting a woman playing chess."

pressing the clock with the wrong hand!

[Roger de Coverly]

pressing the clock with the wrong hand!

I think it was actually Barclays Bank being advertised rather than Barclaycard.

One of the moves didn't look entirely legal. The advert was for a Smartphone app but the chess clock was somewhat retro, being a Garde.

[Stewart Reuben]

Roger >The advert was for a Smartphone app but the chess clock was somewhat retro, being a Garde.<

The reason may be that they were advised to use an analog clock because setting it is easier. Certainly, when being consulted about staging 'CHESS The Musical' that is what I always recommend. Quite apart from the fact it is historically more accurate anyway.

[JustinHorton]

The architecture writer Owen Hatherley has a book coming out about London and an excerpt appears in a tweet from another writer, Dan Hancox. This involves events from the Eighties when Ken Livingstone, having won control of the then County Hall toured the place, finding all sorts of oddities there including

a huge Masonic temple, simply another facility on offer alongside the cinema and after-hours chess club.

[Kevin Thurlow]

"a huge Masonic temple, simply another facility on offer alongside the cinema and after-hours chess club."

Wow! The GLC chess club (later GLCC - Greater London Chess Club, when GLC ceased to exist) was pretty successful with over 100 members at one stage, which probably paled into insignificance compared with the other entertainment...

[Nick Grey]

ITV4 - Lewis. Missed 60 minutes. Why are these murders Chess related? I think a female chess player must be the killer.

[Tim Spanton]

Wikipedia's "Did you know ..." page today (my bolding):

... that early vocational-education advocate Mary Schenck Woolman (pictured) obtained her first teaching position as a result of her "harsh" review of a sewing manual?
... that the seeds of Guilandina bonduc, commonly known as nickernuts, are buoyant and remain viable while being dispersed by ocean currents?
... that Nihonga artist Yumeji Takehisa was arrested in connection with a plot to assassinate Emperor Meiji of Japan?
... that India has 66 chess grandmasters?
... that James Edwin Campbell, the first president of West Virginia State University, was among the first African-American poets to write poems in the African-American vernacular dialect?
... that the Third Punic War between Rome and Carthage ended in the complete destruction of Carthage and the death or enslavement of all of its citizens?
... that Jane Fonda paid for her political activism with the profits of her Workout videos?
... that during the Falklands War, a fishing trawler served in the Royal Navy as HMS Junella?

[John McKenna]

Wikipedia's "Did you know ..." page today (my bolding):

... that early vocational-education advocate Mary Schenck Woolman (pictured) obtained her first teaching position as a result of her "harsh" review of a sewing manual?
... that the seeds of Guilandina bonduc, commonly known as nickernuts, are buoyant and remain viable while being dispersed by ocean currents?
... that Nihonga artist Yumeji Takehisa was arrested in connection with a plot to assassinate Emperor Meiji of Japan?

SNIP

"... many of the people he worked with at the Heimin Shinbun were arrested and executed. Takehisa was arrested and questioned for two days, but was let go..."

(Wikipedia)

NB: "Heimin Shinbun" translates to - The Common People's Newspaper and is what the authorities in Japan in 1910 would have called - a socialist rag.