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Ten years after his acclaimed Finding Bobby Fischer, Dirk Jan ten Geuzendam, the editor in chief of New In Chess, has collected a new series of intimate portraits of the top grandmasters of chess. The title of his new book is The Day Kasparov Quit and it packs 344 pages with fascinating encounters with the greats of our game.
The Day Kasparov Quit is published by New In Chess and can be ordered from all leading chess book suppliers, including, of course, the New In Chess webshop. However, our readers may get the book for free if they correctly identify five quotes from Dirk Jan’s interviews given below!
In the preface of The Day Kasparov Quit, Ten Geuzendam explains that it was his meeting with Bobby Fischer in Sveti Stefan in 1992 that gave him the idea to publish the interview collection Finding Bobby Fischer. This time it was another historic occasion that convinced him to select his favourite interviews from the past ten years: Garry Kasparov’s announcement in Linares last year to quit chess. Not surprisingly, the farewell interview he then had with Kasparov is the final chapter of this new book.
Garry Kasparov announcing his retirement on March 10th 2005
The majority of the interviews in The Day Kasparov Quit first appeared in New In Chess, but three of them appear here in English for the first time. Including one of the author’s absolute favourites, an unforgettable impression of the day he spent in Buenos Aires in the company of the late Miguel Najdorf, back in 1994.
A brief look at the contents shows that Dirk Jan spared no effort to get what he wanted. The 26 interviews with 22 different persons (Anand, Kasparov and Kramnik feature more than once) were conducted in no fewer than 14 countries.
Vladimir Kramnik confidently pacing up and down the stage of the 1992 Manila Olympiad, where he celebrated his 17th birthday with a stunning international debut.
The grandmasters he meets are a motley company. Young stars like US champion Hikaru Nakamura rub shoulders with legends like David Bronstein or Yury Averbakh, whose portraits betray the author’s passion for the history of chess. Vladimir Kramnik explains how the Czech ice hockey team inspired him to beat Kasparov, while Henrique Mecking reveals how Jesus helps him to find the correct move. Most of the players Dirk Jan meets at the international top events, others such as Bronstein, Kasparov and Judit Polgar he visits at their homes.
Garry Kasparov talking to Dirk Jan ten Geuzendam after a press conference at the Linares town hall in 1993. To Kasparov's left: Cathy Forbes and Spanish journalist Leontxo Garcia. To DJtG's right two more journalists: Angel Asensio (Spanish news agency EFE) and Arturo Xicotentatl from Mexico.
Amid meetings with Ilyumzhinov, Taimanov, Shabalov, Kortchnoi, Ivanchuk, Hübner and many others, centre stage is occupied by Garry Kasparov, who topped the world rankings for more than 20 years, a feat unparalleled in any sport. Over the years Dirk Jan ten Geuzendam must have interviewed Kasparov dozens of times. Some of the most memorable of these talks are included here. As said, Kasparov’s dramatic retirement from chess marks the end of the book. It also marks the end of an epoch. An epoch that The Day Kasparov Quit evokes in fascinating detail
On the cover of The Day Kasparov Quit we spotted the following recommendations:
Paul Hoffman, author of The Man Who Loved Only Numbers:
" ‘A wonderful, engaging book. Dirk Jan ten Geuzendam gets the top players to tell us what’s on their minds."
French Champion Joel Lautier:
" When speaking with Dirk Jan ten Geuzendam, players quickly forget that the tape recorder is running and spontaneously share their thoughts, often inspired by his perspicacious remarks. Thanks to his writing talent, the author makes his readers feel and understand why great chess players are true artists."
In one of the first reviews of the book English Grandmaster Luke McShane wrote:
" Quite simply a gem of a book. Dirk Jan is a delicate interviewer who always manages to tease out fascinating tidbits from his quarry. If you’re interested in what motivates great players, their battles away from the chessboard and what they think about life then I can’t recommend this book enough."
Garry Kasparov after his retirement from competitive chess
ChessBase readers can win five free copies of The Day Kasparov Quit if they correctly identify the following quotes from Dirk Jan ten Geuzendam’s book. Who said what?
"Maybe in a year or two I will go into a monastery to clean myself. To clean myself from politics and business. To talk with God. The last time I visited the Dalai Lama in India, he said: 'If you want you can stay for a month or two.' The Pope has suggested the same to me. He offered me a cell in a monastery in Assisi. It depends on God. If I feel the moment is there I will go into a monastery."
"I would sacrifice a knight, but there would always be some emergency exit. A perpetual or I might give a pawn and reach a draw some way. But I might also win, and of course I lost sometimes. I remember sacrificing my queen against Smyslov. The moment I played it I knew that it was incorrect, but that day there were so many spectators and I wanted to offer them some fun."
"I can tell you the funniest thing, when I went in the horse carriage through the streets of Chennai. They took me in this carriage into town and I had to sit there and wave. At some point a bus went by on the other side of the road. The driver just stopped this bus in mid-traffic, jumped off, crosses the railing and shakes hands with me saying how great it was, goes and runs back and drives his bus again. And none of the passengers thought to complain. They were all sitting and waving also."
"There’s a lot that is consuming my energy, because I have to excite myself. Whether I write a book about chess, whether I write a book about decision-making processes and chess philosophy, whether I go to a demonstration in Russia shouting down Putin, whether I am doing a lecture to a business community in Interlaken in Switzerland or in Bela Horizonte in Brazil, unless I excite myself I cannot do it. And I could no longer excite myself."
"I’ve actually always played like that. When you lose or you win, you learn. Whereas some of these draws they don’t really help you. What do you do if you take a draw on move 15 or 20, how does that help you? It may help you in the tournament but do you learn anything from it? I don’t think you do. Basically that’s always been my style, just trying to win and not taking draws."
The answers you can send to: TDKQ@newinchess.com
If there are more than five correct solutions the best answer to the following tie-break question will decide: Who would you like to see interviewed in New In Chess and why?
Solutions should be sent in before March 20. Do not forget to include your postal address. The winners will be announced on the New In Chess website.
