Boris Spassky, the world chess champion whose career was overshadowed by his defeat to Bobby Fischer in the “Century Game” in 1972, died on Thursday (27) in Moscow. He was 88 years old.
His death was announced by the International Chess Federation, the game regulatory body, which did not cite the cause. He had been sick for a long time, having suffered a serious stroke in 2010 that left him in a wheelchair.
Arkady Divokovich, the Federation President, also known as the fide, said in a statement: “He was not only one of the greatest Soviet and world players, but also a true gentleman. His contributions to chess will never be forgotten.”
Spassky had remarkable achievements as a player, but the policy of the game with Fischer at the height of the Cold War, and the attention of the media focused on it, both reduced mere pawns in a wider drama.
Spassky was not happy with full attention. In an interview of 2023 for an exhibition in the Hall of Fame of World Chess in St. Louis, his son, Boris Jr., said: “The role he played in the 1972 game, he always thought of it as a chess player because all the confusion around it, politics, geostrategic, he never mentioned. I am sure that he felt the pressure.”
It was a measure of the resonance of the game that 20 years later, when they made a rematch, attracted worldwide interest, even if both players were well beyond their peak.
When they played the first match in Reykjavik, Iceland, Fischer, with his bold personality, it was something like a popular hero in the West. He was widely portrayed as a lone gunslinger bravely facing the powerful Soviet chess machine, with Spassky representing the repressive Soviet empire.
Reality could not be further from the truth. Fischer was a 29-year-old, often irascible and difficult childhood man. Spassky, 35, was urban, relaxed and in a good mood, giving in to many of Fischer’s demands before and during the game.
The match hardly happened. It was scheduled to start on July 2, but Fischer was still in New York, demanding more money for both players. A British prosecutor James Slater added $ 125,000 to the prize, bending it to $ 250,000 (about $ 1.9 million in current values, $ 11 million in the conversion to Real), and Fischer arrived on July 4.
The match was a better series of 24, with each victory counting as a point, each draw as a half point, and each defeat as zero. The first player to reach 12.5 points would be the winner.
In game 1, played on July 11, Fischer made a mistake and lost. Then he refused to play game 2 less than the television cameras used to record the match were turned off. When they weren’t, Fischer gave up on the game.
The match seemed uncertain, and at the height of the crisis, Secretary of State Henry Kissinger made a personal appeal to Fischer to play. A commitment was achieved, and the match was moved to a small closed gaming area.
Fischer won the game 3, his first victory against Spassky, and crushed him, winning the match for 12.5 to 8.5.
