BOBBY FISCHER THE CAREER AND COMPLETE GAMES OF THE AMERICAN WORLD CHESS CHAMPION
Author: Karsten Müller
Russell Enterprises, Inc (2009)
408 pages
$36.95
Reviewed by John Donaldson
Bobby Fischer may be dead and buried but interest in his life and games continues. The latest book on him, Karsten Müller’s BOBBY FISCHER THE CAREER AND COMPLETE GAMES, seeks to become the definitive work on his creative output.
A comprehensive guide, gathering all of Bobby’s games together is nothing new. Probably the two best-known efforts are Robert Wade and Kevin O’Connell’s THE GAMES OF ROBERT J. FISCHER and BOBBY FISCHER: COMPLETE GAMES OF THE AMERICAN WORLD CHESS CHAMPION by Lou Hays. Both books have appeared in multiple editions with the former the pioneering work and the latter adding over 100 more games – mostly non-tournament efforts. While each of these books provided many annotated games the bulk of them were unannotated. This is where Bobby Fischer: The Career and Complete Games of the American World Chess Champion comes in.
German GM Müller has annotated pretty much every single tournament game Fischer ever played that is available. Games from simuls, blitz or casual encounters are not featured with the exceptions of the 1967 clock exhibition in Manila and one game with Fine. Annotations are understandably not on the level of Fischer’s MY 60 MEMORABLE GAMES, but are often quite detailed, particularly in the endings where Müller is an acknowledged expert. The annotations include lots of explanatory prose as well as concrete variations – this is definitely not a data dump or computer analysis generated book.
Besides annotations to the games, BOBBY FISCHER: THE CAREER AND COMPLETE GAMES OF THE AMERICAN WORLD CHESS CHAMPION offers several other features. Müller provides a very readable account of Bobby’s rise from a 12-year-old who made 50 percent in the 1955 US Junior Open, wins the US Championship three years later, and eventually becomes World Champion. The story will be well known to those who started playing in 1972 or earlier, but younger readers will find it riveting and may have difficulty believing that for a time, however brief, chess was center stage in the United States.
GMs Larry Evans and Andy Soltis provide supporting roles. Evans, Fisher’s longtime friend, occasional second and collaborator on MY 60 MEMORABLE GAMES, gives a personal view of Bobby from their first meeting (a car ride from Montreal to New York after the 1956 Canadian Open) to Fischer’s death. The eleven page opening survey by Soltis is a gem. He not only examines Bobby’s contributions to opening theory (his verdict – Fischer was an unparalleled champion at recognizing the value of long forgotten lines which he reworked perfectly) but also speculates on what novelties Bobby took to the grave.
Another highlight of BOBBY FISCHER: THE CAREER AND COMPLETE GAMES OF THE AMERICAN WORLD CHESS CHAMPION are the numerous photographs and historical artifacts. Many of these photographs have never been published before to this reviewer’s knowledge. Check out the picture of a smiling Bobby and an unidentified friend surrounded by pigeons near what looks to be the monument in Washington Square Park, circa the late 1950s. Also see the ad for the Fischer chess wallet put forward by Bobby’s mother without his knowledge (page 137). While the photographs are not of the frameable quality of THEGAMES OF ROBERT J. FISCHER, they are clear, particularly the larger ones that take up close to half of the roughly 7’ by 10’ oversized pages.
This book features a clear, easy to read two-column layout, complete tournament results, a summary of career highlights as well as ECO and player indexes. It also offers complete crosstables of all events Fischer played in right next to the games. This helps to put things in perspective – Bobby didn’t just win his first US Championship (1957/58), he made a statement with his score of 10.5-2.5, a point ahead of Reshevsky.
BOBBY FISCHER: THE CAREER AND COMPLETE GAMES OF THE AMERICAN WORLD CHESS CHAMPION is the new standard for a one-volume work on all of Bobby’s games, but it would be remiss of this reviewer not to mention some areas where it might be improved for subsequent editions that no doubt will be forthcoming.
Whether to include the first name of Fischer’s opponents has been handled in different ways by different authors. Wade and O’Connell, having access to primary sources like CHESS LIFE and CHESS REVIEW, opted to include them while Hays confined himself to first initials. BOBBY FISCHER: THE CAREER AND COMPLETE GAMES OF THE AMERICAN WORLD CHESS CHAMPION, like Wade and O’Connell, decided to provide as much information as possible.
This really isn’t a problem for players active the past couple of decades. First names for them can be reliably found at ChessBase and on FIDE rating lists. Unfortunately for earlier times and less well-known players, resources are more limited. The standard is Jeremy Gaige’s CHESS PERSONALIA. This work is extremely comprehensive but even it doesn’t list most non-masters. For American chess, particularly the 1950s when Bobby was starting out, CHESS LIFE and CHESS REVIEW (available in PDF format on DVD from 1946-75 and 1933-69 respectively by Tobychess.com) are excellent resources, albeit time consuming. It would appear that BOBBY FISCHER: THE CAREER AND COMPLETE GAMES OF THE AMERICAN WORLD CHESS CHAMPION decided to use ChessBase unilaterally as the source for first names. This resulted in some unfortunate choices.
The following list, in no way detracts from the games and analysis in this book, but was a little disconcerting.
Game 13 Henry not Heinrich Gross
Game 18 Wilmer not Vincent Stevens (Wilmer E. Stevens was the 1954 and 1962 Wyoming state champion)
Game 75 Leonard not Leroy Hill
Game 77 Andy (or Andrew) not Armin Schoene
Game 83 Charles not Volker Witte
Game 424 L.W. not T.J. Beach
There are many first names missing for American players that are not in Müller’s book but do appear in Robert Wade and Kevin O’Connell’s THE GAMES OF ROBERT J. FISCHER. There also some glitches where some times the player’s first names are given and other times they are not (see Whisler and Bertok for two examples). The gremlins are at work on game 148 where Fischer plays Jaime (read Emma, Jaime). The reference to game 538 was likely meant for game 612, though in both cases Bobby really made something out of nothing against Damljanovic. Game 429(a) is not new, having appearing first in the NY TIMES soon after the event and later INSIDE CHESS, the Hays book on Fischer and THE UNKNOWN BOBBY FISCHER. These very small caveats aside, BOBBY FISCHER: THE CAREER AND COMPLETE GAMES OF THE AMERICAN WORLD CHESS CHAMPION is a fine book that would enrich any chess collection.
