ATampa Bay Times, St. Petersburg, Florida, Sunday, December 20, 1987 - Page 8 (★)
After 15 years, reclusive Fischer casts a long shadow
New York — Bobby Fischer's spirit haunts the grandmasters of chess, 15 years after he made his last move.
The American who became a folk hero for wresting the chess world championship from Russian Boris Spassky in 1972 has neither played a tournament nor an exhibition match since.
He prefers the life of a recluse, rejecting comeback offers and ostracizing his friends.
Some chess enthusiasts still dream that he will attempt a comeback, but Fischer is famed for retreating at the last moment.
American chess book dealer Ed Labate said books on Fischer's games and a biography still sell the most and adds:
“Bobby is the Elvis Presley of chess: He still makes money after he is, figuratively in his case, dead.”
In print and on television the past three months, experts used the 1987 title contest between Kasparov and Karpov in Seville, Spain, to recall the brilliance of Fischer, the man who popularized chess in the United States more than any other player.
“Whenever there is a world championship match, there is always the shadow of Fischer over the board. his spirit hogs the board,” said Larry Parr, editor of Chess Life, published by the United States Chess Federation.
Fischer, an undefeated champion who remains the highest-rated player in history, lost the title by default in 1975 when he failed to agree with the international chess authorities on conditions for a match with Karpov.
Analyst Eliezer Agur writes in a series on Fischer's games in the November issue of Chess Life that he “quit playing at a moment when his possibilities appeared limitless.”
According to the gossip at his old haunts in New York, Fischer lives a secluded life in Pasadena, Calif., satisfied with a small income derived from book royalties. He shows no interest in returning to competitive chess.
Others say Fischer lives on the cheap, reads literature of extremist politics and shuns people who might talk about him to reporters. They despair that his circle of confidants is steadily decreasing.
“Bobby is living quietly. He sees only a few special friends who protect him because he really wants to be very private,” one international player said.
Friends say he sometimes plays informally and reads magazines to keep in touch with chess.
“There is not much hope that he will play chess seriously again,” said one associate.
Earlier this year, Fischer rejected a lucrative offer to return to tournament play and exhibition games, the associate said. “He could have made millions.”
Fischer refuses interviews, and the few people who still correspond or are in contact with him decline to discuss his lifestyle.
“That's how Bobby's lost all his friends,” said one.
Shelby Lyman, host of a weekly television series on the match in Spain, recently devoted a large part of his program to Fischer.
The film shows stills of Fischer in a baggy sweater and his hair closely cropped, becoming at age 13 the youngest master in the history of the game and playing tournaments around the world.
It rolls on finally to Fischer stepping off the plane at Reykjavik, Iceland, where he defeats Spassky to complete his finest accomplishment at the age of 29. That was 1972.
“Bobby Fischers come around only once every 100 years,” said Lyman, who is also a syndicated chess columnist.
Grandmaster Edmar Mednis, who wrote a book in 1973 on how to beat Fischer, hails the American as the world's most powerful player.
“Nervousness never entered his conscience or sub-conscience. He was single-minded and knowledgeable;…his whole game was excellent,” Mednis said.
Mednis said that Fischer has never considered the conditions he has been offered to be satisfactory for a comeback.
“It's no secret that he is in two minds about whether he wants to come back to play,” the grandmaster said.
On the walls of the Manhattan Chess Club in new York, where the young player received his training, a fading oil painting depicts Fischer moving the white pieces.
In an adjoining room, a framed black-and-white photograph illustrates Fischer's magnetism even at an early age. He sits pensively over the board with a hand pressed on his mouth, oblivious to the onlookers crowded around the table.
The Manhattan club, founded in 1877 and the oldest continuous club in the world, operates a school chess program, perhaps in the hope of unearthing another Fischer.
Club membership increased dramatically when Fischer was crushing the world's top grandmasters in the early 1970s and declined just as swiftly after his baffling disappearance from the scene.
In those early days of his absence, observers speculated that it was just another of Fischer's extended exiles from the game. Three times during the 1960's, the unpredictable genius stepped out for periods of up to two years.
Although this exile is probably final, the reputation of the man has not been seriously harmed.
“Oh…we really miss him,” said Manhattan Chess club president Douglas Bellizzi.
