Vladimir Savon (1940-2005) is an unfamiliar name among many chess fans today. Yet, at the peak of his strength in the early 1970s, he proved more than a match for many of the best players of the day. His greatest success was undoubtedly his first place, by a point-and-a-half, in the 39th USSR-ch in Leningrad,…
“The blue bird, soaring in the clouds…” The 1960 victory of Boris Spassky victory against David Bronstein, in which he sacrificed a rook for the sake of an attack on the enemy king, is celebrated as one of the most famous chess games of all time; indeed, it featured in the 1963 James Bond film…
A short blog post featuring Spassky’s annotations to two of his games from the Mar del Plata tournament of 1960, translated from the original Russian. (A .PDF file of the annotations is available to download.) The above photo (obtained from the website of Friðrik Ólafsson) shows the participants in the Mar del Plata tournament. Fischer…
In the summer of 1959 Mikhail Tal was at the height of his powers. He had just taken 1st place in the international tournament at Zürich, ahead of Gligorić, Fischer and Keres, and in September he would dominate the Candidates’ Tournament held in the Yugoslav cities of Bled, Zagreb and Belgrade, gaining the right to…
A little-known but very interesting game from early in Tal’s career, with annotations, previously unpublished in English, by both players. This game was played in the 17th round of the 22-player 24th USSR Championship final, which was held in Moscow during January and February of 1957. It appears with annotations by both players in ‘Chess…
(Reshevsky faces Botvinnik during the 1955 USSR-USA match in Moscow; Mark Taimanov looks on. Photo credit: A. Cheprunov, via RIA Novosti.) During June 1954 a match between the USA and USSR had taken place at the Roosevelt Hotel in New York city, over 4 rounds and 8 boards. The visitors won by the score…
A short biography of the Soviet grandmaster, with a selection of annotated games available as a .PDF download. Introduction In a chapter dedicated to Levenfish in his marvellous book , ‘Russian Silhouettes’, Genna Sosonko writes: In the chess history of the last [20th] century, with its wealth of events and personalities, his name can be found…
Hidden deep in the pages of the 1960 Soviet Chess Yearbook are annotations by Boris Spassky to a game played by Bobby Fischer in the Mar del Plata tournament of 1960. This game is relatively little known and is by no means a classic, although does provide an example of the clean positional style and…
On 27th August 1986 the life of the very strong grandmaster from Soviet Central Asia, Georgy Azgamov, was tragically cut short in an accident in the Crimean peninsula. Agzamov had been participating in an ‘Otborochnii’ (qualifying) tournament for the 54th USSR-ch at Sevastopol, where he finished a ½-point behind the winners. Details of how he met…
A short article devoted to the life and games of Lev Solomonovich Aronin. By profession a meteorologist, Aronin was one of the most talented Soviet players of the post-war years. Biographical Details Born on 20th July 1920, Aronin learned to play chess in his home city of Kuibyshev (which has since reverted to its pre-revolutionary…
