Here is a brief excerpt from Leonard Barden's Spassky obituary:
In the summer of 1946, Spassky began to visit a chess pavilion in the city’s Central Park and became obsessed with the game: “I used to go at 11am and return home at 11pm. When the pavilion closed in September it was like death, with no chess.” At the age of 10, Spassky beat the world’s best player, Mikhail Botvinnik, in a simultaneous exhibition, and improved rapidly. By 15, he was the youngest ever Soviet master, with a positional and solid style.
On his international debut, aged 16, at Bucharest in 1953, he defeated the world No 2 Vasily Smyslov. At 18, he won the world junior crown and became the youngest ever grandmaster to date, while at 19 he tied for third in the 1956 world championship candidates tournament in Amsterdam.
In the next few years, however, tension and over-ambition set him back. A key game came in the final round of the 1958 USSR championship at Riga, where he needed to beat the new Latvian star Mikhail Tal to qualify for that year’s world title interzonal. Play was adjourned after 45 moves and five hours, and both grandmasters stayed up all night to analyse.
“I was very tired and went to resume … dishevelled and fatigued. Then I was like a stubborn mule. Tal offered a draw, but I refused. I felt my strength ebb, I lost the thread of the game, and my position deteriorated. I proposed a draw, but Tal refused. When I resigned, there was a thunder of applause, but I was in a daze and hardly noticed. I walked out to the street and cried like a child.”
On his website chess historian Edward Winter has posted a large collection of material on the tenth world champion, all meticulously documented. There are also many pictures from contemporary books, magazines and newspapers. Examples:
Spassky v Fischer, Reykjavik, 1972
Another section of Chesshistory deals with the legendary match, with material you will not find elsewhere. You can spend a few very satisfying hours perusing the page, which is divided into multiple sections:
Section 1: Predictions
Section 2: James Slater
Section 3: Seconds and preparations
Section 4: Reykjavik
Section 5: Television and film footage
Section 6: 29...Bxh2 in the first match-game
Section 7: Press coverage
Section 8: Cartoons and comic strips
Section 9: Post-match
Section 10: Books on the match
Section 11: Memorabilia
Section 12: Works of fiction
Section 13: Junk
This is hardly the last you will hear on the subject on the ChessBase news page. Spassky and Fischer were the pioneers of modern chess – the game as we know it today.
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