You all remember how in October 2020 Netflix broadcast The Queen's Gambit, a seven-episode series set in the 1950s–60s, about (fictional) chess prodigy Beth Harmon. It quickly became the platform’s most-watched miniseries, earning widespread critical acclaim and numerous awards, including eleven Primetime Emmys and two Golden Globes. It triggered a global surge in chess interest among new and returning casual players, and together with the Covid pandemic did more for online chess than anything before it. Queen's Gambit also inspired more women and girls to take up chess, and increased the visibility of real‑life female players and streamers.
Now Netflix is poised to do it again: this Friday (February 6th) it will broadcast a documentary about GM Judit Polgar's rise from child prodigy to one of the world's top playersm male or female. It describes her unique upbringing, the enormous obstacles the young Hungarian and her sisters had to face, her dramatic encounters on the board, where she once actually beat Garry Kasparov. We reported on the project and showed you a trailer last month.
So keep this Friday free for a special chess treat. To prepare you for it we bring you a chapter from the book Chess Stories by Frederic Friedel and Christian Hesse. It describes Frederic's encounter with Judit and the Polgar family over 40 years ago.
Chapter 25: Encounters–
Judit and her chess family
Judit Polgár is a Hungarian chess player, the strongest female chess player of all time. She achieved the title of grandmaster at the age of 15 years and 4 months, breaking the record previously held by former World Champion Bobby Fischer. She is the only woman to be in contention for the (open) World Chess Championship. That was in 2005. Judit is also the only female to have crossed 2700 Elo, reaching a peak rating of 2735 in 2005, when she became the first (and only) woman to be ranked in the top ten of all chess players in the world. She remained the top-rated woman until her retirement on 13 August 2014.
I first met the Polgar family almost forty years ago, in Budapest. Actually I went over to their flat to talk to Zsuzsa (Susan), who was the 14-year-old rising star of women's chess. I met László Polgar, the father who had initiated the chess boom in the family, his wife Klara, who speaks many languages, and their two younger daughters.
It was during the World Microcomputer Chess Championship. I asked Susan about her cute little sisters. "Do they also play chess?" She smiled and answered simply: "Sure." Later, I invited Susan to play a game against one of the strongest chess programs in the world at the time. "Let my sisters play," she said.
And play they did, against the Fidelity computer that went on to win the Word Micro Computer Championship. I was called away before the first game ended. After the second I returned and asked Fidelity programmer Kathe Spracklen (operating the program in the picture), tongue-in-cheek, whether the girls had beaten the computer.
"Of course not," she replied, "they did not beat it. How could you imagine that? They are just babies. No, they did not beat it, they murdered it, they tore it to bits, they chewed it up and spat out the pieces, they massacred the thing!" Never before or since have I seen a chess programmer so flushed with pleasure at the defeat of their own program.
"So they are very strong players?" I said to Susan. "Yes, especially the little one," she answered. "Watch out for her, she will be the strongest of the three of us!"
In the following years I was in Budapest a number of times, usually staying in the Polgar flat. I began to see that Judy was really something special. I remember late one night when Susan was analysing with a trainer, a strong IM. They reached an endgame and could not figure out how to play it. "There is some trick here," said the IM. So they woke up Judit and carried the girl into the training room. Judy, still half asleep, rubbed her eyes, showed them the win, and was put back into her bed.
One time we went to see FIDE president Florencio Campomanes in his hotel suite in Budapest. The Polgars were having a lot of trouble with the Hungarian Chess Federation, so that the meeting has somewhat touchy overtones. To break the ice, Campo suggested some blitz games, where he had a fair reputation.
László Polgar offered him blindfold games against his youngest daughter. Judit sat with her back to the board, stretching her hand behind her to operate the clock. László dictated Campo's moves to Judit, who at the time spoke only Hungarian. They played two or three games in this fashion. If you want to know the result, look carefully at Campo's face and see Kathe Spraklen's memorable quote above.
The three Polgar girls were also keen table tennis players. The first time I played against Judit I managed to win. The look on her face was unequivocal: I'm gonna come back, and I'm gonna kill you, buddy! She started taking lessons from a professional and the next time I faced her she pulled out a devastating top spin. The result: once again cf. Kathy Spracklen above.
For a long time I was only able to communicate with Judy with tickles and shoves. A common dialogue during walks along the Danube River in Budapest went as follows:
Susan: "Stop it, Judit, behave yourself!"
Judit: "But he started it! I'm just fighting back."
All of this in Hungarian. Then one day, in May 1989, the four Polgar women (Klara and her daughters) visited my home south of Hamburg. And Judit beamed at me: "I can speak English now, Frederic." She spoke an unambitious but expressive English. We went on to become close friends.
There is one story that must be told. At the time of the aforementioned visit, my son Martin had a white rat, appropriately named Basil. It was a gentle creature, but all the Polgars were terrified of it – except Judit, who would take Basil up and try to force her sisters and her mother to pet it. In the picture you can see the obvious affection between Judy and Basil.
Well, Basil was used to certain rituals. Every morning when Martin came down for breakfast, he would give Basil a morsel of rat food – you know: a piece of leftover pizza, a slice of salami or a Dorito chip. Basil would eagerly wait for the treat, pacing around the cage in anticipation. The animal had, however, one concern in life: that one day its owner would stick the food into the cage and then suddenly change his mind and pull it out again. So when it was stuck in, Basil would grab it with both front legs and teeth, and actually lie on its back until Martin moved away and the coast was clear to roll over and enjoy the treat.
One morning it was Judit who came down first. She went over to Basil and, with the words "Hello little ratty", she stuck her finger into the cage. The rest is too gruesome to narrate. Just that Judy put a plaster over the wound and was convinced that she was going to die. But she never told anyone what had happened, only the next day, when it became obvious that she would live and the bite was not so bad after all.
In closing here's an interesting picture from 1993 – Judit playing against an early version of Fritz on a notebook, with some Indian dude watching. Judit managed to lose one of the games, upon which the Indian GM grabbed me and physically pinned me to the floor. He kept shouting "Quick, Judit, press Ctrl-N" (new game), while I shouted "Press Ctrl-S, press Ctrl-S!" (save). Unfortunately she listened to him, so that game is forever lost.
Judit always insisted on playing in men's (actually: unrestricted) events, with the clear goal of going for the World Championship title. She never tried for the women's world title (her sister Zsuzsa won that). All the world's leading players have suffered losses to Judit Polgar, including former world champion Garry Kasparov. In 2003 she came clear second in the Category 19 Corus chess tournament in Wijk aan Zee, Netherlands, undefeated and just a half-point behind Viswanathan Anand, and a full point ahead of classical chess world champion Vladimir Kramnik.
The above graphic shows Judit Polgar's 2014 rating, when she retired, and her highest rating (light area on top), compared to the other top female players in the world.
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Note: the authors will donate all proceeds to ChessBase's India HelpChess foundation, which has zealously contributed to the ascent of India to the status of chess superpower.
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