The claim to be the best ever in chess, in any category, is usually backed up by either hard numbers (Karpov's number of grandmaster tournament wins is not open to debate), or strong opinions such as the best absolute player. But the debate on the greatest prodigy seems to lie somewhere in between, depending on your criteria. Read this article and see if you agree. (photo: Capablanca at age four)
75 years ago, on 28 May 1947, the American Grandmaster and renowned writer Andrew "Andy" Soltis was born in Hazleton, Pennsylvania. In an extensive interview Soltis talks about his chess and his writing career, chess in New York, the Marshall Chess Club, playing blitz against Bobby Fischer and about Fabiano Caruana and Magnus Carlsen. | Photo: Marcy Soltis
Yuri Averbakh is no more. Tributes are pouring in from all over the world to the late grandmaster, who had only recently turned 100 and chess fans had celebrated the day. Not many are aware that he wrote his autobiography years before. Our columnist had begun a series on this fascinating work and narrated how it all began. Then came the Ukraine war, and he could not bring himself to write anything in the face of this tragedy. Sadly, the war is continuing, and our columnist has reconciled himself to writing. Importantly, this series is a homage to the life and work of a great player. | Photo: Eric Koch / Anefo
Between 16 and 24 June 1954 a match was held in New York’s Hotel Roosevelt between the Soviet and the US chess teams. The eight-board, four-round match ended with a decisive 20-12 victory for the Soviets. In an article for the New York Times ahead of the match, US chess champion Samuel Reshevsky shared his thoughts on how the Soviets (whom he kept calling ‘the Russians’) became so good at chess and why this was so important to them. The Britisch Chess Magazine have reproduced this article, which shares a view on the role chess had, both as an internal and external weapon, for the Soviets.