4/26/2024 – BBC Factual announced a new competition format, “Chess Masters”, for BBC Two and iPlayer. Across eight episodes, passionate and highly skilled players from all backgrounds will battle it out across a series of rapid chess games before one will be crowned the title of Chess Master. The announcement comes a bit over 40 years after BBC2 aired “The Master Game”, a popular show that ran for seven series, from 1976 to 1983.

2/15/2023 – Top Iranian chess player Sara Khadem has gone into exile, like many other Iranian chess players before her, and now lives with her family in Spain. Yesterday, the BBC published a podcast in which Sara Khadem talks about her motives for leaving Iran. | Photo: Lennart Ootes

2/24/2020 – A subplot of the recent Women's World Championship in Shanghai and Vladivostok was the plight of accomplished arbiter Shohreh Bayat from Iran. She was the target of political and religiously-motivated media critiques in her home country when she was photographed, while working as the chief arbiter in Shanghai, wearing a loose-fitting hijab — too loose for conservative observers in the Islamic Republic. That led her to fear for her safety and forgo her return ticket home in favour of a detour to the U.K. In a tearful interview, she recently recounted her story for the BBC.

3/26/2019 – Just a week ago, 8-year old Tanitoluwa Adewumi was living in a New York City homeless shelter. But a story in the New York Times about his success at the NY State Scholastic Chess Championship launched the boy to international prominence and prompted a GoFundMe campaign which has raised nearly $250,000 dollars. | Photo: "Just Tani" GoFundMe page

7/3/2018 – The two best female players of all time recently came together for The Conversation, a BBC podcast interview. They spoke about their respective chess careers as the best women in the sport, the challenges they each faced, and how they chose to transition away from dedicated competition. These are subjects both have dealt with often before, but rarely have the two come together for a direct back-and-forth conversation like this.

5/20/2017 – In a country as vast as India, peppered with villages all over, economic prosperity is often the difference between folding in on itself or survival. Many villages suffered from rampant illicit gambling and alcoholism. Marottichal was one such, until one day, a man opened a teashop and began teaching everyone chess, and now chess is seen everywhere. BBC reports.

5/19/2016 – The US Congress has declared St Louis the chess capital of the nation. For the BBC, British journalist Dave Edmonds, chess enthusiast and co-author of the book "Bobby Fischer Goes to War", visited the town, blitzed and trash-talked outside the St Louis chess club, talked to sponsor Rex Sinquefield and checked out the chess scene to find out why chess in St Louis is so special.

5/6/2015 – Fans of the BBC Radio programme "Across the Board" can rub their hands in glee, since the broadcaster has decided not to wait until October for the next season, and has started Season three now, with a new series of personalities. The first on the list is the English snooker legend, Steve Davis, six-time winner of the world title, and co-author of two chess books.

4/11/2015 – The prospect of a game of chess over the radio combined with an interview is now an established success thanks to its revival by Dominic Lawson. Readers will recall that BBC Radio 4 has resurrected a concept dating back to Bobby Fischer with the series "Across the Board". Not limiting itself to it, Tim Harford interviewed John Nunn on math, computers and Lasker.

11/4/2014 – Wikipedia describes Demis Hassabis as "a British artificial intelligence researcher, neuroscientist, computer game designer, and world-class games player." While accurate, this doesn't begin to do him justice. At 13 he was second in chess only to Judit Polgar, at age 17 he designed a hit video game. He now sold his company DeepMind to Google to work on Artificial Intelligence.

10/31/2014 – Sol Campbell is one of England's great defensive footballers, having a key role in all the teams he played for, and is the first to represent England on the pitch at six consecutive international tournaments. In 2002, after the World Cup, he was the only England player to be named in the FIFA World Cup All-Star Team. And he regularly plays chess.

10/30/2014 – The third episode of Across the Board brought in Sigrid Rausing, founder of the Sigrid Rausing Trust, one of the United Kingdom's largest philanthropic foundations, having distributed over 200 million pounds to human rights organizations in the last decade. She is the heiress and granddaughter of Ruben Rausing, the founder of the Tetra Pak company, and plays chess every day.

10/29/2014 – In this second episode, Dominic Lawson interviewed Murray Campbell over the internet as the latter was playing from New York. For those who do not know, Murray Campbell was one of the key figures behind Deep Blue, the computer that famously beat Garry Kasparov in 1997. Campbell discusses artificial intelligence, Kasparov's cheating accusations and solving chess.

10/28/2014 – The first game of the second season of Across the Board pitted World Champion Magnus Carlsen against Dominic Lawson, while Dominic pelted Magnus with questions on whether he felt he might have applied his intelligence to some other field, what does the laziness reputation really mean, and despite this he concluded the show with a spectacular queen sacrifice.

10/27/2014 – Last year the BBC resurrected a chess program for their radio station BBC Radio 4, "Across the Board", a concept that had last seen the light of day over 50 years earlier. The program consisted of interviews conducted by Dominic Lawson after playing a game of chess with celebrities. The second season is about to start with Magnus Carlsen heading a fascinating lineup.

1/6/2014 – After reading listening to the BBC Radio program "Across the Board" with great pleasure, a certain curiosity came on the previous chess effort by the British broadcaster, now only available in the book, "Chess Treasury of the Air". Though full of fascinating essays, player profiles and more, the crown jewels are the consultation games. Here is Bobby Fischer analyzed by GM Alejandro Ramirez.

1/5/2014 – In the last episodes of the BBC Radio program “Across the Board”, Dominic Lawson interviews the only professional player in the series, Hou Yifan, as well as Natan Sharansky, a prominent Israeli politician, human rights activist and author. Nathan Sharansky was sent by the Soviets to a Siberian Gulag where he survived by playing endless games of chess in his mind. Life imitates fiction.

1/3/2014 – As previously announced mid-December, the BBC Radio program “Across the Board” has started, featuring Dominic Lawson, the Sunday Times and Daily Mail columnist, and also club player, who interviews five personalities whom chess has touched in its own way. The first three episodes are up with interviews of John Healy, Rachel Reeves, and Lennox Lewis. Well worth listening too.

12/19/2013 – Believe it or not, but on Monday, December 30, BBC Radio 4 will start a week-long series of 15-minute chat shows on… chess! The program Across the Board will feature Dominic Lawson, the Sunday Times and Daily Mail columnist, who will play against and interview a different guest each episode on five consecutive days. This is the first time in 50 years since the 1960s radio show with Bobby Fischer.

7/6/2013 – The very popular BBC chess-themed TV show ran for seven series between 1975 and 1982. In his previous report John Saunders described its genesis and importance in bringing chess to mainstream television. In this second part he gives us an impression of the players' live commentary that was part of the appeal of the show. Two series of The Master Game are now being released on DVD.

7/2/2013 – This very popular BBC TV show ran for seven series between 1975 and 1982. It consisted of a chess competition specially staged for TV, with top national (and later international) players, usually on a knock-out basis, with the games being shown with the players’ own commentary being used as a voice-over. Two series of The Master Game are now being released on DVD. John Saunders reports.