cumulative effect of the sound was that of a mild winter wind or the roll of a summer surf. At times, when a dubious or complex combination was played, or when the diminutive American Reshevsky took one hour and ten minutes
on one move
, twenty-two hundred eyebrows seemed to rise in unison. If the noise in the hall became too intrusive, Hans Kmoch, the ultraformal bow-tied referee, would stare angrily out at the audience and issue a stern, Dutch-accented
“Quiet, please!”
Stung by the rebuke, the spectators would look momentarily embarrassed and quiet down for a few minutes.
Bobby enjoyed being in the hall, and kept a scorecard as if he were at Ebbets Field. The eleven-year-old carefully penciled in the results for each game: zeroes for losses, ones for wins, and halves for draws. He attended all four rounds, unaware that in just a few short years he’d be facing, in separate tournaments and matches on different continents, fourteen of these same sixteen players from the United States and the USSR, a conglomeration of the finest players in the world.
Aside from following the action in the ballroom, Bobby liked the analysis room. There, out of earshot of the contestants, top players were discussingand analyzing in depth every game, move by move, as it was played. Bobby wasn’t confident enough to offer an opinion as to what move a player should or shouldn’t make, but he was delighted that he could predict some of the moves before they were made and could understand after the fact why others were played.
Finally, after four days of play, the United States team had taken a humiliating beating, falling to the Soviets 20–12. At the final round, the applause from the American audience appeared to be sincere and respectful, but privately, a plaintive cry went up among many of the chess players: “What’s wrong with American chess?” An editorial in
Chess Life
lamented the loss of the vanquished team and tried to explain it: “Once again in the USA vs. USSR Team Match we behold reiterated proof that the gifted amateur is rarely, if ever, the equal of the professional.No matter how talented by natural heritage, the amateur lacks that sometimes brutal precision that marks the top professional as master of his trade, that almost instinctive pre-vision which comes only from constant practice of the art under all conditions and against all sorts of opposition.” With heavy hearts, Nigro and Bobby rode the subway home to Brooklyn. If Bobby took anything away from that match, it was the knowledge that the Soviet players were the best in the world. It was a realization that made him fairly seethe with purpose.
The following year, in July 1955, a return match in Moscow was even more distorted in favor of the Soviets: The Americans lost again, this time 25–7. Banner headlines in newspapers across the globe ballyhooed the match, however, and the American players had their picture splashed across the front page of
The New York Times
, as well as other newspapers throughout the world. The amount of ink was attributable to the fact that Nikita Khrushchev and Nikolai Bulganin paid a surprise visit to a garden party held in Moscow for the American chess team.There Khrushchev issued a policy statement to the effect that the Soviet Union was solid as never before, and he was willing to pursue détente between both countries as long as the United States agreed to talk “honestly.”
During that same summer of the Americans’ annihilation by the Soviets, Bobby Fischer, now twelve, was engaged in his own battles on the board,playing in a tournament in Greenwich Village. The scene at the outdoor chess tables in Washington Square Park was a mélange of urban vitality and color. In contrast to the subdued, almost meditative pairings at the Brooklyn Chess Club, the park’s contests were waged by a fast-talking and disparate group of chess hustlers, Village bohemians, and tournament-strength players who enjoyed competing in the open
on one move
, twenty-two hundred eyebrows seemed to rise in unison. If the noise in the hall became too intrusive, Hans Kmoch, the ultraformal bow-tied referee, would stare angrily out at the audience and issue a stern, Dutch-accented
“Quiet, please!”
Stung by the rebuke, the spectators would look momentarily embarrassed and quiet down for a few minutes.
Bobby enjoyed being in the hall, and kept a scorecard as if he were at Ebbets Field. The eleven-year-old carefully penciled in the results for each game: zeroes for losses, ones for wins, and halves for draws. He attended all four rounds, unaware that in just a few short years he’d be facing, in separate tournaments and matches on different continents, fourteen of these same sixteen players from the United States and the USSR, a conglomeration of the finest players in the world.
Aside from following the action in the ballroom, Bobby liked the analysis room. There, out of earshot of the contestants, top players were discussingand analyzing in depth every game, move by move, as it was played. Bobby wasn’t confident enough to offer an opinion as to what move a player should or shouldn’t make, but he was delighted that he could predict some of the moves before they were made and could understand after the fact why others were played.
Finally, after four days of play, the United States team had taken a humiliating beating, falling to the Soviets 20–12. At the final round, the applause from the American audience appeared to be sincere and respectful, but privately, a plaintive cry went up among many of the chess players: “What’s wrong with American chess?” An editorial in
Chess Life
lamented the loss of the vanquished team and tried to explain it: “Once again in the USA vs. USSR Team Match we behold reiterated proof that the gifted amateur is rarely, if ever, the equal of the professional.No matter how talented by natural heritage, the amateur lacks that sometimes brutal precision that marks the top professional as master of his trade, that almost instinctive pre-vision which comes only from constant practice of the art under all conditions and against all sorts of opposition.” With heavy hearts, Nigro and Bobby rode the subway home to Brooklyn. If Bobby took anything away from that match, it was the knowledge that the Soviet players were the best in the world. It was a realization that made him fairly seethe with purpose.
The following year, in July 1955, a return match in Moscow was even more distorted in favor of the Soviets: The Americans lost again, this time 25–7. Banner headlines in newspapers across the globe ballyhooed the match, however, and the American players had their picture splashed across the front page of
The New York Times
, as well as other newspapers throughout the world. The amount of ink was attributable to the fact that Nikita Khrushchev and Nikolai Bulganin paid a surprise visit to a garden party held in Moscow for the American chess team.There Khrushchev issued a policy statement to the effect that the Soviet Union was solid as never before, and he was willing to pursue détente between both countries as long as the United States agreed to talk “honestly.”
During that same summer of the Americans’ annihilation by the Soviets, Bobby Fischer, now twelve, was engaged in his own battles on the board,playing in a tournament in Greenwich Village. The scene at the outdoor chess tables in Washington Square Park was a mélange of urban vitality and color. In contrast to the subdued, almost meditative pairings at the Brooklyn Chess Club, the park’s contests were waged by a fast-talking and disparate group of chess hustlers, Village bohemians, and tournament-strength players who enjoyed competing in the open
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