Which famous chess player appears in John Donne's poem "At the Round
Earth's Imagined Corners"?

On Oct 5, 2:17*pm, "
wrote:
Which famous chess player appears in John Donne's poem "At the Round
Earth's Imagined Corners"?

If this is the poem you had in mind, I fail to see where any
particular human person is mentioned, let alone a chess player:

AT the round earths imagin'd corners, blow
Your trumpets, Angells, and arise, arise
From death, you numberlesse infinities
Of soules, and to your scattred bodies goe,
All whom the flood did, and fire shall o'erthrow,
All whom warre, dearth, age, agues, tyrannies,
Despaire, law, chance, hath slaine, and you whose eyes,
Shall behold God, and never tast deaths woe.
But let them sleepe, Lord, and mee mourne a space,
For, if above all these, my sinnes abound,
'Tis late to aske abundance of thy grace,
When wee are there; here on this lowly ground,
Teach mee how to repent; for that's as good
As if thou'hadst seal'd my pardon, with thy blood.

Furthermore, through Donne's lifetime (1572-1631), there had been
very few famous chess players, at least in Europe. Ruy López
(1530?-1580?) and Giacchino Greco (1600-1634) are about the only ones
that come to mind offhand.
So whom did you have in mind?

On Oct 5, 11:41 pm, wrote:
On Oct 5, 2:17 pm, "

wrote:
Which famous chess player appears in John Donne's poem "At the Round
Earth's Imagined Corners"?

If this is the poem you had in mind, I fail to see where any
particular human person is mentioned, let alone a chess player:

AT the round earths imagin'd corners, blow
Your trumpets, Angells, and arise, arise
From death, you numberlesse infinities
Of soules, and to your scattred bodies goe,
All whom the flood did, and fire shall o'erthrow,
All whom warre, dearth, age, agues, tyrannies,
Despaire, law, chance, hath slaine, and you whose eyes,
Shall behold God, and never tast deaths woe.
But let them sleepe, Lord, and mee mourne a space,
For, if above all these, my sinnes abound,
'Tis late to aske abundance of thy grace,
When wee are there; here on this lowly ground,
Teach mee how to repent; for that's as good
As if thou'hadst seal'd my pardon, with thy blood.

Furthermore, through Donne's lifetime (1572-1631), there had been
very few famous chess players, at least in Europe. Ruy López
(1530?-1580?) and Giacchino Greco (1600-1634) are about the only ones
that come to mind offhand.
So whom did you have in mind?

Actually, this was my question - I used someone else's computer.
No chess player is mentioned. He *appears* in the first line.
And his name is....
(it's a bit farther down....)















Vladimir Simagin.
Greetings to all! Keep up your efforts!

On Oct 6, 12:23*am, Offramp wrote:
On Oct 5, 11:41 pm, wrote:





On Oct 5, 2:17 pm, "

wrote:
Which famous chess player appears in John Donne's poem "At the Round
Earth's Imagined Corners"?

* If this is the poem you had in mind, I fail to see where any
particular human person is mentioned, let alone a chess player:

AT the round earths imagin'd corners, blow
Your trumpets, Angells, and arise, arise
From death, you numberlesse infinities
Of soules, and to your scattred bodies goe,
All whom the flood did, and fire shall o'erthrow,
All whom warre, dearth, age, agues, tyrannies,
Despaire, law, chance, hath slaine, and you whose eyes,
Shall behold God, and never tast deaths woe.
But let them sleepe, Lord, and mee mourne a space,
For, if above all these, my sinnes abound,
'Tis late to aske abundance of thy grace,
When wee are there; here on this lowly ground,
Teach mee how to repent; for that's as good
As if thou'hadst seal'd my pardon, with thy blood.

* Furthermore, through Donne's lifetime (1572-1631), there had been
very few famous chess players, at least in Europe. Ruy López
(1530?-1580?) and Giacchino Greco (1600-1634) are about the only ones
that come to mind offhand.
* So whom did you have in mind?

Actually, this was my question - I used someone else's computer.
No chess player is mentioned. He *appears* in the first line.
And his name is....
(it's a bit farther down....)

Vladimir Simagin.
Greetings to all! Keep up your efforts!

Ah, yes -- "Earth'S IMAGINed corners." I tried reading down the
first letter of each line for a hidden name, and got nothing, but it
did not occur to me treat the whole poem like a word search puzzle.
Clever. And it got me reading Donne for the first time since high
school, and made me realize where sci-fi author Philip Jose Farmer got
the title for one of his novels.

On Oct 6, 2:21 pm, wrote:
On Oct 6, 12:23 am, Offramp wrote:

Ah, yes -- "Earth'S IMAGINed corners." I tried reading down the
first letter of each line for a hidden name, and got nothing, but it
did not occur to me treat the whole poem like a word search puzzle.
Clever. And it got me reading Donne for the first time since high
school, and made me realize where sci-fi author Philip Jose Farmer got
the title for one of his novels.

And I have just acquired the novel, following your advice.
I have never heard of him - Farmer - and I have a few other books to
read. But hopefully I'll be able to read it soon.
Thank you Taylor.

"Offramp" wrote in message
...

Actually, this was my question - I used someone else's computer.
No chess player is mentioned. He *appears* in the first line.
And his name is....
(it's a bit farther down....)

Interesting. Was it intentional?

On Oct 6, 9:52 pm, "John Salerno" wrote:
"Offramp" wrote in message

...

Actually, this was my question - I used someone else's computer.
No chess player is mentioned. He *appears* in the first line.
And his name is....
(it's a bit farther down....)

Interesting. Was it intentional?

My English teacher pointed this oddity out to me.

He said, "Vladimir Pavlovich Simagin was a much-admired Soviet player
and teacher. He was a late bloomer by chess standards, although much
of this can be put down to the timing of World War II, which stopped
most chess competition in the Soviet Union for several years. He
became an International Master in 1950, and earned the Grandmaster
title in 1962. He also earned the International Master title in
Correspondence Chess in 1965, and was Soviet correspondence champion
in 1964. He scored 8.5/17 in the 1945 Moscow Championship, for a tied
7th-8th places, well behind champion Vasily Smyslov. Simagin's first
important high-class result was second place in the 1946 Moscow
Championship, with 11/15, behind winner David Bronstein. In the 1946
Baltic Championship at Vilnius, he scored 13/19 while playing 'hors
concours', and this was good for fourth place, behind the top placed
Yuri Averbakh (also h.c.). In the 1947 Moscow Championship, he tied
for top place with Bronstein and Georgy Rivinsky, with 9/14, and then
won the playoff match-tournament. Also in 1947, he tied for 1st-2nd
with Semyon Furman in the Championship of the Spartak Club, with
15/19, and also won that playoff match. It took him some time to
qualify for his first Soviet final. He was unsuccessful in the semi-
final at Leningrad 1945 (URSchsf-14) with 5.5/15 for a tied 14th-15th
place. He improved the next year, also at Leningrad (URSchsf-15) with
9.5/18, but this was not good enough to advance. In the semi-final at
Vilnius 1949 (URSchsf-17), he again failed to move on with a tied
7th-8th place, at 9/17, with the winners being Furman, Vladas Mikenas,
and Alexei Sokolsky. He improved at Tula 1950 (URSchsf-18) with 8/15
for a tied 5th-7th place, but still fell short, as the winners were
Averbakh and Georgi Boriskenko. At Pärnu 1947, he struggled with 4/13,
far behind winner Paul Keres. Being Moscow champion helped earn him a
place on the Moscow side for the home-and-home match series with
Budapest in 1949. This was one of the very best results of his career,
as he scored a powerful 12/16, good for a 2732 performance, according
to chessmetrics.com. Chessmetrics ranks Simagin as #21 in the world
from December 1946 to February 1947, and calculates his peak rating at
2650 in October 1949. However, this data seems to be missing several
of his tournament results. In the Moscow Championship of 1949, he made
8.5/15 for 4th place, behind winner Averbakh. In the Moscow
Championship of 1950, he scored 8/15 for 5th place, behind winners
Averbakh and Alexander Chistiakov.
Simagin, along with Vladimir Makogonov, trained Vasily Smyslov for
several years, leading to his World Championship title in 1957. His
best results were a tied 2nd place at Sarajevo 1963, and a tied 1st
place at Sochi 1967. Simagin had a bold and imaginitive playing style,
and he was an expert tactician. His style has been compared to both
Richard Reti and Bent Larsen. He was a profound originator in the
openings. Examples of his contributions include the Accelerated Dragon
variation in the Sicilian Defence, the Grunfeld Defence, the Simagin
variation of the Nimzo-Indian Defence (1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.e3
0-0 5.Nge2 d5 6.a3 Bd6), and Simagin's Defence (1.e4 d6 2.d4 c6 3.Nf3
Bg4). Simagin was most highly regarded by his peers. Bronstein had
some very complimentary words in his acclaimed book The Sorcerer's
Apprentice (co-author Tom Furstenberg). Mikhail Botvinnik, who devoted
many pioneering years to computer chess research, relied on Simagin's
assistance in 1966 to publish a preview article from his forthcoming
book Algorithm of Chess in the Bulletin of the Central Chess Club, of
which Simagin was editor. The article's publication had first met with
resistance, so Botvinnik was grateful, and the article was a success.
The Russian chess writer and master Lev Khariton wrote a touching
tribute to Simagin on his chesscircle.net site. Khariton had met
Simagin when he was still a young junior player, and trained in a
group setting with him. Khariton quotes Simagin as saying: "In chess,
as in life, all the time you have to overcome obstacles. When you play
a game, your opponent with each move sets up barriers before you, the
barriers you have to overcome. It seems that you have overcome one
barrier, but at his next move you encounter another obstacle to
overcome. And it goes on all the time, and he appeared in the
following poem by John Donne."

He then recited the poem, which we had to copy out and memorise.
He was a very good teacher, but he often went off on TANGENTS.

On Oct 6, 4:37*pm, Offramp wrote:
On Oct 6, 2:21 pm, wrote:

On Oct 6, 12:23 am, Offramp wrote:
* Ah, yes -- "Earth'S IMAGINed corners." I tried reading down the
first letter of each line for a hidden name, and got nothing, but it
did not occur to me treat the whole poem like a word search puzzle.
Clever. And it got me reading Donne for the first time since high
school, and made me realize where sci-fi author Philip Jose Farmer got
the title for one of his novels.

And I have just acquired the novel, following your advice.
I have never heard of him - Farmer - and I have a few other books to
read. But hopefully I'll be able to read it soon.

When I read this years ago I quite liked it. There are a number of
sequels, and opinions vary as to how fast they decline in quality, but
not as to the decline itself.
Personally I recommend reading the first two, then carry on to the
third only if you really liked the second.

He has another series, the "World of the Tiers" series which is
somewhat similar in theme (starts with "A Private Cosmos"). This
series is good for about four books, though again, opinions differ.

Farmer was under considerable pressure from fans to finish these
series, so possibly wrote the books before he was ready to, and as I
understand it he had money problems as well.

William Hyde

On Oct 6, 4:37*pm, Offramp wrote:
On Oct 6, 2:21 pm, wrote:

On Oct 6, 12:23 am, Offramp wrote:
* Ah, yes -- "Earth'S IMAGINed corners." I tried reading down the
first letter of each line for a hidden name, and got nothing, but it
did not occur to me treat the whole poem like a word search puzzle.
Clever. And it got me reading Donne for the first time since high
school, and made me realize where sci-fi author Philip Jose Farmer got
the title for one of his novels.

And I have just acquired the novel, following your advice.
I have never heard of him - Farmer - and I have a few other books to
read. But hopefully I'll be able to read it soon.

Farmer is a very famous sci-fi author. This book is part of his
"Riverworld" series, several novels set on a far-off planet created by
some mysterious and incredibly advanced alien race, on which every
human who has ever lived is somehow reincarnated. Everyone, from
Neanderthals to 20th-century people, is restored as an adult in his/
her prime, with all his memories of life on Earth but nothing else.
The various novels feature such famous folks as Jesus Christ, Herman
Göring, Mark Twain, actor Tom Mix, explorer Richard Francis Burton,
Alice Plesasance Liddell (of Lewis Carroll fame) and others. Perhaps
not as good as his "World of Tiers" series, but pretty good.

Thank you Taylor.

You're quite welcome.

On Oct 6, 3:52*pm, "John Salerno" wrote:
"Offramp" wrote in message

...

Actually, this was my question - I used someone else's computer.
No chess player is mentioned. He *appears* in the first line.
And his name is....
(it's a bit farther down....)

Interesting. Was it intentional?

Considering Donne died in 1631, probably not.