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| Posted by r_lawrence mailcafe.net 1/10/2003 00:39:46 Play online chess |  Subject: Shed some light on Alekhine ...Message: Modern chess writers frequently sum up the personal life of Alekhine by saying such things as, "Great player, too bad he was a nazi sympathizer" (Seirawan's Winning Chess Tactics for one). But I recently read a memoir of Alekhine by J. Du Mont, and here is a summary of some of the things he wrote. At the time of the onset of WW II, Alekhine was the coach of the French team, and was at a tournament in Buenos Aires. He immediately left, and felt it was his duty to join the French Army (which he did) and take part in the war. France fell, and his wife was taken by the Germans. It seems that he very much loved his wife, and sought permission to join her. The nazi's, seeing this as a tremendous propaganda opportunity .. allowed it and used him. Shortly after this, 2 viscious anti-Jew, pro-nazi articles appeared with his name on them. Alekhine was largely disdained from this point on by the chess community. Years later, after the war was all over, Alekhine declared most solemnly that not a word of these articles was written from his pen. So ... two very different stories here. Did Alekhine get a 'bad rap'? Was this a result of him just wanting to be reunited with his wife? If anyone has any more sources, I'd love to hear/learn more. | ||||||||||
| Posted by zdrak mailcafe.net 1/10/2003 02:57:04 Play online chess | Message: Here is an interesting article, written by Hans Kmoch. The author of the article knew Alekhine personally, and he claims that his antisemitism was genuine. And I quote: "Much later, some noble whitewashers .... explained that Alekhine had been forced to write those infamous articles. But that is simply a variant of the story of the drunkard who befouls his pants and then wonders who might have done it." The full article can be seen here: www.chesscafe.com/text/kmoch05.txt Believe it ? Or not ... ? | ||||||||||
| Posted by r_lawrence mailcafe.net 1/10/2003 06:54:05 Play online chess | interesting ... Message: But I do wonder how much is true and how much is false. a. Alekhine continued to beat the worlds best players as a complete drunk? b. Kmoch's wife was Jewish (bias) c. Kmoch was Alekhine's 2nd (bias) d. What could be the point of such a stinging, viscious article? I'm not denying that some of it may be true .. i'm just wondering if there was more to the story as Du Mont indicates ——— On Chess: Underdog Israelia threat to Anand — Boris Gelfand, an Israeli chess grandmaster born in the former Soviet republic of Belarus, has had a singular career. In 21 years of tournament play, excelling at both traditional and rapid chess, he has won, finished second or tied for second in 43 of 52 tournaments. Yet he hasn’t been able to gain the title of world chess champion. Seeming to improve with age, Gelfand achieved his best result in 2007 when he tied for second with the then-reigning world chess champion, Vladimir Kramnik. The world title tournament was won by Viswanathan Anand, who remains world chess champion. In the spring, Gelfand will square off with Anand in a match for the title. Gelfand stands in sharp contrast to his ... Posted by zdrak | mailcafe.net 1/10/2003 08:40:15 Play online chess Message: a. Kmoch is not alone in the claim. Euwe also stated that during the matches of '35 and '37 Alekhine drank. And he won one of these matches, as we know. b. Kmoch's wife was Jewish ? So is mine.... are you trying to imply that a person somehow involved with the Jewish race is incapable of making a trustworthy judgement in those questions ?? Please explain exactly what you meant ?? c. Unfortunately, all the writers of articles about Alekhine are divided into two parts: 1. Those who have no relation to Alekhine - no indication of bias, but no 1st hand information either. 2. Those who do have a relation to Alekhine - first hand information, but can be accused of bias .... It's a question of who do you choose to believe basically ... d. I have no idea. Btw, I also do not necesserily support Kmoch 100%, but since you asked for some information, I provided it to you. I'm just somewhat disappointed with your responce, especially with (b) ——— Masters of the Game and Leaders by Example — Fewer than 2 percent of the 47,000 members of the United States Chess Federation are masters — and just 13 of them are under the age of 14. Among that select group of prodigies are three black players from the New York City area — Justus Williams, Joshua Colas and James Black Jr. — who each became masters before their 13th birthdays. “Masters don’t happen every day, and African-American masters who are 12 never happen,” said Maurice Ashley, 45, the only African-American to earn the top title of grandmaster. “To have three young players do what they have done is something of an amazing curiosity. You normally wouldn’t get something like that in any city of any race.” The chess federation, the game’s ... Posted by tulkos | mailcafe.net 1/10/2003 09:00:22 Play online chess In the match with EuweMessage: Alekhine explained his single loss in the match by saying that he had drank to much that time. During that match he had often had to be helped to his chair at the board. ——— Michael Adams takes gold as England struggle at Euro Team Championship — Michael Adams's individual gold medal was the standout of an uneven and sub-par England performance at the European team chess championship which ended at Halkidiki, Greece on Friday. The British chess champion scored an unbeaten 6.5/9, outplayed Ukraine's chess star Vasily Ivanchuk in the decisive final round and nosed out Armenia's Levon Aronian for the top board gold. Gawain Jones, 23, added to his growing reputation with zestful play and a 6/9 total but David Howell, arriving straight from the middle of his university term, had four defeats in his five games. Overall England, seeded No8, ended 22nd among 38 teams. Germany were the shock team winners, beating the Chess Olympiad champions ... Posted by parrvert | mailcafe.net 1/10/2003 09:49:36 Play online chess What is it with chess players? Message: From what I have read both Steinitz and Morphy went mad, Alekhine was a drunken Nazi and as for Fischer... ——— Chess and poker - alike and so different — I was watching ESPN Sunday night, and I noticed the World Series of Poker was being shown. One of the announcers noted that there was an "expert" chess player at the final table. In chess lingo, an expert is someone just below master level (unlike bridge, where an expert is above master). Over the years, I have met many bridge, poker, backgammon and chess players, and many who play more than one of those games, if not all. Often these game players talk about what skills are necessary to be a top player in each. Of course, the commentators on ESPN gave their 2 cents about poker and chess. Phil Hellmuth, a famous poker player, said that a lot of chess players ... Posted by myway316 | mailcafe.net 1/10/2003 14:55:28 Play online chess It's true...Message: ...Alekhine did write those articles. The original copies, in his own handwriting,were found amomg the effects of his last wife,after she died,in 1956,I believe. ——— Chess: The battle of Kasparov's pupils — The Russian chess master has mentored both Carlsen and Nakamura – and the former is favourite to win in London, as this earlier victory suggests. DK: This week it was revealed that Hikaru Nakamura, the US chess no.1, has been receiving tuition from the former world chess champion Garry Kasparov. Although Kasparov retired in 2005 to go into Russian politics, he hasn't made a clean break with the chess world. He insists he won't return to playing serious tournament chess, but pulling strings behind the scenes as a coach is the next best thing. What makes this news so intriguing is that not too long ago Kasparov was tutoring the world no.1 Magnus Carlsen. By all accounts their working relationship came to ... Posted by r_lawrence | mailcafe.net 1/10/2003 22:47:08 Play online chess Zdrak ...Message: Sorry, but you mistook my comment (b.) completely! To which you replied: "b. Kmoch's wife was Jewish ? So is mine.... are you trying to imply that a person somehow involved with the Jewish race is incapable of making a trustworthy judgement in those questions ?? Please explain exactly what you meant ?? " and .. "Btw, I also do not necesserily support Kmoch 100%, but since you asked for some information, I provided it to you. I'm just somewhat disappointed with your responce, especially with (b)" I'm sorry if you took that the wrong way ... I have a lot of Jewish friends! I was just stating it may be a possibility that Zmoch was biased because of a few different things, that all. |