Posted on 06/13/2003 9:34:51 AM PDT by bedolido
It is unlikely that a man stranger and more mysterious than the American Bobby Fischer ever was, is or will ever appear in the chess world. He is a man about whom legends are composed already during his life. But it is more frequent that no news is available about Fischer at all. The man is elusive. Nobody can say for sure where Bobby Fischer has been living within over the past decades, or whether he is still alive at all. He was to celebrate his 60th birthday this March. The great chess player is some a kind of a myth in a human image. Lots of things were written and reported about Fischer: Ssome considered him crazy, others said he was a genius brilliant paranoiac and the thirds others said and still insist that Bobby Fischer is a real national American hero.
At the age of 15, Fischer became the youngest in the history international grand master in history. He participated in championships for the national champion title 8 times and always won. He never stopped to shock the audience.
In 1972, Bobby Fischer nearly lost a championship with Soviet grand master Boris Spassky. The game was decisive not only for him, but for the whole of America as well. The Ccold War was at its height, and it was a nice opportunity to hurt the USSR , but in a sphere where Americans, unlike Russians, were never strong. However, Fischer, who was 29 at that time, preferred a favorite Icelandic TV program of his to the tournament with Spassky. Nevertheless, the game took place and Fischer won it.
The man, who became a national hero, never stopped surprising people. He declined contracts of many millions of dollars and refused to be friends with the rich and the famous, all those whom he thought to be "predators". Finally, in 1975 the International Chess Federation couldn't stand Fischer's seclusion and stripped him of his champion title. No reaction to the fact followed from the grand master.
In 1992, Bobby Fischer decided to confirm his champion title. An unofficial return match with Russian Boris Spassky was organized, where Fischer was the winner again. After the match he disappeared once again.
Many adherents of Western values think this behavior of the chess champion is not quite adequateright. However, it is highly likely that Fischer's ideology, some kind of his own philosophy, is the explanation to this strange behavior. The Russian newspaper Trud-7 reported in its publication about Bobby Fischer this year that: "His vision of the world is as follows: a powerful mafia group of Ccommunists and Jews is haunting him with a view to poisoning him. The CIA also participates in the plot, as it helped to deprive Fischer of all his fortune. Osama bin Laden is a hero, but Hitler -"was too ceremonious-" with Jews, he should have given them short shrift. Synagogues must be destroyed and Jews must be liquidated." (Aand this is at the time when Fischer's mother was a true-bornfull Jew and he himself was born in a Jewish district of Chicago.)
We think the phenomenon of Bobby Fischer is deeper and more complicated. What is interesting is that, the return match with Boris Spassky was organized in 1992 in Yugoslavia, at the time when the international sanctions were imposed on the country and entry of Americans was prohibited to Yugoslavia. Those who violated this instruction of the US Department of State were subject to a very serious punishment. This is the reason why Bobby Fischer preferred Yugoslavia for the match. In his words, the USA is following the a genocidale policy with respect to other countries (the Vietnamese campaign, Serbia, etc.). As Fischer confessed himself, he had been paying no taxes to the treasury "of this state" since 1976. He said he wouldn't pay a cent of taxes after the return match with Spassky.
In 2001, the international chess magazine Chess Informant declared Bobby Fischer to be "the best chess player of the 20th century". In the world rating published by the edition, Fischer won 79.9% of the votes, being slightly ahead of Russia's Garry Kasparov (77.7%), then followed the Soviet legendary chess player Alexander Alekhine (60.2%). The same year, right after the 9/11 tragedy, Bobby Fischer showed up again. As the above-mentioned Russian newspaper Trud-7 reports, "Some man who said he was Bobby Fischer called a Philippine radio station and said that on 9/11 the US got what it deserved. He said he was applauding those who did it. As it turned out, he had picked out the Philippines long ago for making such anti-American statements."
That fact was also noticed in Russia. On the tragic days after the 9/11, Russia's television channel NTV reported that "the legendary American grand master Bobby Fischer said in an interview to an unknown Philippinoe radio station he was unspeakably happy about the 9/11 acts of terrorism in the USA."
The Associated Press published sensational information in 2002. IAs it turned out later that, for a very long period of time, the FBI suspected Bobby Fischer and his mother Regina (Regina Fischer lived in the USSR in 1933-1938;, she got married in Moscow) were of being Soviet spies. It was surprising that the FBI kept a look-outan eye over on the Fischers for 30 years! Their correspondence was scrutinized, their neighbors were interrogated, and so on. Finally, the Fischers were acquitted for the lack of convincing proof.
Rumors say, now Bobby Fischer lives somewhere in South-Eastern Asia and practically doesn't show appear. It is said, he is married to a Philippine woman and has a little daughter. Other sources say that Bobby Fischer is in Budapest, the version suggested by Vishwanathan Anand. He said that Bobby Fischer still actively played chess on the Internet. Although, as Anand said at that, "Bobby never plays under his real name and has many aids." So, there is no chance to determine for sure who is exactly at the other end of the Internet.
In November 2002, the Budapest newspaper Nepszabadsag confirmed Anand's words and wrote that "the great hermit" recently lived in Hungary's capital. The edition reported that the chess player probably had a Hungarian background. His real father, the newspaper wrote, probably was Hungarian mathematician Paul Nemenji, a friend of his "official father" Hans-Gerhard Fischer. It was allegedly reported that the mathematician had a love affair with Regina Fischer, and the ex-champion was born in 1943.
It is still a mystery what is truth and what is not.
He's obviously not an idiot so we can't call him an idiot savant. But in that interview I thought he came across as uneducated, unread, inarticulate and COMPLETELY ignorant of the world. No one in their right mind would care what he thinks, unless it has to do with chess.
There's no doubting his intelligence or his analytical ability though. He and John Nash ("A Beautiful Mind") would probably have gotten along well together. Or, killed each other.
Hey Fischer: Pork you and the 'ho you came out of, pawn-pusher.
Heckuva chess player, though.
LOL, I'd bet my bottom dollar he views this running battle with the government as a giant chess game. Hellish nightmare: We all wake up morning and find Bobby Fischer standing over America screaming CHECKMATE!!!.
And those people are as nutty as he is.
wow being really good at chess, what a genius!! i bet i would kick his butt at "sorry" or "monoply" so i guess that makes me a genius also.
he may be good but can he play 3-D star trek chess?!?! i think not
it sorta annoys me when people call him a genius. he was really good at chess, big deal. that has to be up there with E=MC squared.
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