In the summer of 1972, the eyes of the world turned to Iceland. On the first day of September, almost two months of chess crunching ended with one phone call.
1.9. 21:15•Updated 1.9. 21:47
It’s 1962 and a photographer Carl Mydans follows the life of a young man in New York. Images of the subway, bookstore, ball game and pinball hall are recorded on black and white film.
The clubs hit the metal ball to bounce chaotically around the court. The lights flash and the points grow to thousands and thousands. I saw a 19 year old Robert James “Bobby” Fischer disconnects his thoughts for a moment from chess, which will bring him to the attention of the whole world in 10 years.
For years, Fischer’s life had mostly revolved around chess. He won his first US championship at the age of 14 and by the 1960s had already played in European tournaments against the top players of the Soviet Union.
Superluapaus’ career went on a rollercoaster ride in the 1960s. Fischer sought to become a contender for the world championship match as early as 1962. He had won the Interzonal qualifying tournament in Stockholm with impressive numbers, but fourth place in the bachelor tournament was a bitter disappointment.
Fischer blamed the Soviet Union Efim Keller, Paul Keres and the eventual victory of the tournament and the world championship match Tigran Petrosian that they played easy draws against each other to save their strength against Fischer.
Considering the zeitgeist, it is quite possible that the Soviet players actually played fixed games. On the other hand, Fischer’s accusations gave a first taste of his paranoid and conspiracy-loving nature.
Fischer did not participate in the qualifying tournaments of the next world championship match at all. In 1967, he was seen again in the Interzonal tournament, from which Fischer retired in the lead midway through the tournament.
Fischer then went on to win every tournament and match throughout the remainder of his career, eventually clawing his way into the 1972 World Championship by crushing the Soviet Union Mark Taimanov and Danish Bent Larsen both 6-0.
Petrosian, who was only turned as the last stone, ended Fischer’s incredible 20-game winning streak, although he lost the match by a clear final count.
The goals are Cold War heroism and a big wallet
Three years had passed since the first step on the surface of the Moon. The Soviet Union and the United States had taken fierce strides in the conquest of space and wanted to show their power to the other pole of the world.
For the Soviet Union, chess was also an important way to demonstrate superiority, and unlike the race to the moon, on the 64-square board, the Eastern Bloc was completely sovereign.
Soviet players had won all the world championships since the format came under the auspices of the World Chess Federation (FIDE) in the 1940s.
Even though the 1970s was a time of easing of superpower relations, it was undeniably clear that Reykjavík would be played for something other than the world chess championship.
Experts have believed that Fischer got an added boost from a kind of man-versus-machine setup: in chess, the Soviet Union had enormous muscle, and the grandmasters worked together to get at Fischer’s weaknesses.
In addition to Cold War heroism, Fischer was motivated by money. The American initially did not agree to go to Iceland unless the prize money was doubled. A British businessman rushed in Jim Slaterwho contributed $125,000 of his own pocket to get Fischer to agree to play Boris Spassky against.
Moka, surrender win, secret phone calls and intrusive cameras
July 11 in Iceland: exactly at five o’clock Boris Spassky moves the pawn from in front of the queen to square d4 and starts the game clock.
2,300 people are waiting in the stands of the Laugersdalhöll arena. Fischer, who rowed and felted before the match, is not seen in the hall for nine long minutes.
To the surprise of the whole world, Fischer eats the pawn on h2 with a bishop, leaving his bishop stuck. The grandmasters in the hall can’t believe their eyes.
Over the years, the move has been analyzed again and again: maybe the transmitter switch to two pawns doesn’t lose outright, but Fischer seals his loss by fouling even later in the endgame.
Fischer gives up on the 56th move and protests the cameras in the arena and suspects the chairs have been tampered with. He demands that the disturbing cameras be removed, but the editor Lothar Schmidt cannot meet the requirement.
Kissinger and the US champion of William Lombardy persuaded, Fischer stays on Icelandic soil and returns to the hall the next day.
Spassky accepted Fischer’s wish to move the rest of the games from the skull place to the back room, where table tennis was normally played.
For Spassky, this probably cost him the world championship, but for the world, it guaranteed the continuation of a unique match. The final reversal of momentum took place in the sixth game (you move to another service)after which Spassky is said to have given Fischer a standing ovation.
Fischer eventually won the match sovereignly, losing only one of the remaining games. Eleven games were drawn, Fischer won six, and on the first day of September, Lothar Schmid received a phone call announcing that Spassky had conceded the match.
The Soviet Union’s hegemony on the chessboard was – if not completely broken, at least dented.
Surrender, disappearance, exile
In 1975, Fischer was supposed to defend the world championship against a new challenger, the young star of the Soviet Union Anatoly Karpov against.
Fischer had not played a single competitive game since the World Championship match and presented Fidel with a list of his demands. When the sports association did not fulfill them unconditionally, Fischer withdrew from the match and Karpov became the new world champion without a fight.
For two decades, Fischer did not play a single competitive game – except in 1977, when the former world champion visited the MIT chess computer.
Long hidden from view, Fischer unexpectedly challenged Spassky to a rematch in 1992. Fischer believed he was still the true world champion and suspected that the championship matches played during his absence were rigged.
The rematch between Fischer and Spassky was played in Yugoslavia under UN trade transfer. Due to the violation of the trade transfer, the United States issued an arrest warrant for Fischer, who fled over the years in Budapest, the Philippines and Japan, where he was finally imprisoned because of an expired passport.
However, the former world champion never had to return to the United States and get to know its penal institutions. Fischer was granted political asylum in Iceland, which he and Spassky had put on the world map in the middle of the Cold War.
In his final years, Fischer raved about how the United States deserved the 2001 terrorist attacks and gave several anti-Semitic sermons in radio interviews. Many who met Fischer doubted his sanity.
If there were official diagnoses of mental health problems, at least they were never made public. Many have been guessed: among others, schizophrenia or suspicious personality disorder.
Bobby died in Iceland in 2008, leaving behind no statues or memorials. Robert James Fischer’s small white tombstone stands in the yard of a small white church in the village of Laugardælir outside Reykjavík.
Fischer was 64 years old when he died, as many years as squares on a chessboard.
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The popularity of chess increased during the corona period, as well as the 1972 world championship match. Watch an interview with chess master Mika Karttunen on the subject here