Bobby Fischer Photos and Quotes

Fischer, who may or may not be mad as a hatter, has every right to be horrified. -- Jeremy Silman (on changes made to the new edition of My 60 Memorable Games)

He just wouldn't listen to reason. -- Larry Evans (on Fischer)

Fischer is a law unto himself. -- Larry Evans

Even as a boy, Bobby was his own man. He knew what he wanted, he felt that he knew what was right, and he made his own decisions. Once convinced of something, his integrity, pride and absolute independence ruled out any compromise. Once he made up his mind there was no changing it. Many often had a go at it; Ethel and I never did. And even when the general consensus was that he was dead wrong, it turned out more often than not that he was right. As the heart has its own reasons, so has genius. -- Jack Collins

Fischer became paranoid about giving away his secrets. -- Larry Evans

Fischer is under obligation to nobody. -- Joseph Platz

I guess a certain amount of temperament is expected of geniuses. -- Ron Gross

The huge egos of great chess players are legendary. Psychologists have been amazed by their vanity, have studied it, and anecdotes concerning it are abundant. But never before has there been such a prima donna as Bobby. Already he has managed to alienate and offend almost everybody in the chess world. That includes officials, patrons, writers, almost everybody and anybody who might be in a position to help him in his career. -- Al Horowitz

It is, sadly, altogether too easy, in fact effortless, to find legions of people, not just chess players, who have every reason to say, and have (and please believe me that I do not do this out of spite or rancor) from the earliest days of Fischer's career to this very day, he has been labeled: brash, arrogant, selfish, self-centered, boorish, loutish, cruel, unreasonable, difficult, impossible, inconsiderate, ungrateful, petty, petulant, sulking, crass, insensitive, irrational, contentious, argumentative, aggravating, insulting, crazy, wicked, and mad. I would tend to agree. -- Paul Kollar

He has hurt and abandoned those who have helped him, those who have admired him, and those who have loved him. He has rejected calls from his friends, his community of fellow chess players, and from his country to do what was right or fitting. He has displayed a McCarthyite, commie-bashing, jingoistic political stance while inexplicably avoiding military service, despite having been a 1A-draft candidate, attaining a very convenient rejection from his local draft board. His erstwhile cold war patriotism was later much diluted by his defying, and spitting upon, State Department edicts. He skulked away from the first challenge he had for the, not his, world title, and was happy to let the world think he was victimized. He cloaked his fearful evasion with an over- elaborate pretense of remaining steadfast and principled, a favorite trick of his, and gulled many thanklessly loyal supporters into making tortured and quasi-moral excuses for him. Yet before this pathetic farce, he played not one single game, not one, as champion. What cabal or KGB conspiracy was responsible for this craven non- performance? -- Paul Kollar

Ironically, if Fischer had behaved impeccably at Reykjavik, his overall superior skill would have carried him through anyway; such was the level of his play then. And if Fischer, three years later, gave FIDE, or even Karpov, the right to decide all the match issues, and behaved as graciously as any perfect host, he would have won that match too. He was inhumanly great. He was indisputably the best chess player of all time. But this is very difficult for some of us to see and admit unless we turn off all peripheral vision, and suspend all moral judgments until...when? Is near-perfect chess worth this sacrifice? If we were to learn, nightmarishly, that Beethoven was an arsonist, or an abuser of children, would his string quartets still thrill and lift us? It's a bit of a dilemma. What can we legitimately excuse for the sake of art? Fischer has not, of course, physically hurt anyone. But he has, in my opinion, been guilty of chronic, execrable bad behavior for forty plus years. He has, by repeated, continual assaults on common standards of decency and social decorum, approached, if not reached, the level of the sociopath. His actions immediately before the match at Reykjavik and during the first three games should have resulted in a permanent censure, or at least a day or two in the stocks. -- Paul Kollar

Fischer sacrificed virtually everything most of us "weakies" (to use his term) value, respect, and cherish, for the sake of an artful, often beautiful board game, for the ambivalent privilege of being its greatest master. He even sacrificed his mother, Regina, to become the King of Chess. Anything is permissible if it wins...sac the queen...the king's the thing...isn't it, Father? Wherever you are, isn't it? -- Paul Kollar

He is an American chess tragedy on par with Morphy and Pillsbury. -- Mig Greengard (on Fischer)

Bobby Fischer’s current state of mind is indeed a tragedy. One of the world’s greatest chess players - the pride and sorrow of American chess. -- Frank Brady (on Fischer)

Regardless of Bobby’s recent hate-filled rantings, which I abhor, he is nonetheless one of the greatest chessplayers of all time. -- Frank Brady

The Unknown remains, probably forever inexplicable, regardless of how many yellowed game scores, cracked newspaper clippings, and curled and faded old photos are uncovered. My appreciation, even awe at his chess talent aside, the nicest thing I can say about Bobby Fischer is that he's a genuine enigma. -- Paul Kollar

You want to know what I want? I'll tell you what I want. I want back what Bobby Fischer took with him when he disappeared. -- Ben Kingsley (from Searching For Bobby Fischer)

What is chess, do you think? Those who play for fun or not at all dismiss it as a game. The ones who devote their lives to it for the most part insist that it's a science. It's neither. Bobby Fischer got underneath it like no one before and found at its center, art. -- Ben Kingsley (from Searching For Bobby Fischer)

The beauty of his games, the clarity of his play, and the brilliance of his ideas have made him an artist of the same stature as Brahms, Rembrandt, and Shakespeare. -- David Levy (on Fischer)

Chess is not to him a means to an end, a subsidized sport, a forum for testing philosophic hypotheses, or an outlet for baser emotions. To Fischer, chess is an end in itself. -- Anthony Saidy

I regard him as a mythological combination of sorts, a centaur if you will, a synthesis between man and chess. -- Garry Kasparov (on Fischer)

If one may judge a player's strength by comparing him with his contemporaries, it seems to me that Fischer's achievement is unsurpassed. The gap between him and his closest rivals was the widest there ever was between a World Champion and the other top-ranking players of his time. He was some 10-15 years ahead of his time in his preparation and understanding. This could be attributed in part to his dedication to the game, which was unequaled by any other player before or since. -- Garry Kasparov

It’s impossible to compare two players from different epochs. It’s extremely unfair because we know more now and also because my opponents are stronger than those Fischer had to face. I am not trying to underestimate Fischer’s achievements! The only real point of comparison between the two of us is the size of the gaps between ourselves and our respective opponents. I think that the gap between Fischer and his opponents is still the widest in chess history. The only possible way to compare Fischer, Botvinnik, Morphy, Steinitz and Kasparov is to place them in the context of their eras and to measure the distance between themselves and their opponents. Fischer’s distance was vast! -- Garry Kasparov

By this measure, I consider him the greatest world champion. -- Garry Kasparov (on the gap between Fischer & his contemporaries)

Bobby never cared about money, though. His only desire was to prove that his choices were correct: He wanted chess to be important, because he was a chess player, and he wanted to be important. Bobby knew money was important, but he didn't have a clue why, outside of clothes and status. The only way he could accomplish what he wanted was to fight for a lot of money. Once he got it, he gave it away. He did not know how to spend it. And once he'd become champion, after, essentially, sacrificing his life for it, he didn't know how to spend his time. -- Bob Wade

There's no doubt that the title meant something to him. It meant more than anything. Proof of that is the fact that after winning it he stopped competing. But with or without the title, Bobby Fischer was unquestionably the greatest player of his time. -- Burt Hochberg