Bobby Fischer died

[gambitnut]

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5gZKsZzl...nnwvuQD8U8G7AG0

Great chessplayer, crazy person.

I wish we could've seen more chess games from him after he became world champion.

 

[speeds]

Him being antisemitic caught me off guard. I guess I really didn't know anything about him outside of his accomplishments.

 

[Dumpy]

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (speeds @ Jan 18 2008, 04:26 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>Him being antisemitic caught me off guard. I guess I really didn't know anything about him outside of his accomplishments.</div>

There are plenty of Bobby's games to study. He was a great player who changed the perception of chess in this country, and many people learned to play in the aftermath of his victory over Spassky. Unfortunately, he suffered from mental illness and never got help for it. Equally as unfortunate is that fans, critics, and especially the press continued to try to seek him out when such ill people need to be left alone in private, and he was ridiculed by the world when his viewpoints became public. This is a brilliant man who (allegedly) spent time homeless in Los Angeles and experienced fits of paranoia. No one will ever know what caused his illness, but some will point to the fact that his childhood was spent staring at an 8x8 grid all day, where your opponent is always planning to get you.

Will he be missed? I don't know. It's undisputable, however, that his named towered over the chess world for decades, and that there is no one else with such strength of personality to take his place and seize the imagination of a generation of pawn-pushers.

 

[gambitnut]

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (speeds @ Jan 18 2008, 01:26 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>Him being antisemitic caught me off guard. I guess I really didn't know anything about him outside of his accomplishments.</div>

He also thought women are weak. He was definitely crazy. I think you have to be a little crazy to be a good chessplayer, but I hope you don't have to be quite as crazy as him to be as good as him at chess.