Those who have followed Ilymzhinov's attmepts to make his town of
Elista into Chess City, should know that Ilymzhinov is following the
text of the most famous Russian satire novel Twelve Chairs, written in
the 1920s. In one episode, the main hero, a brilliant swiddler Ostap
Bender, who needs money desperately, pretends to be a chess grandmaster
and gives a paid lecture to the local chess enthusiasts at the
porvincial town of Vasyuki. In it he goess off and starts presenting a
grandious plan how chess can turn Vasyuki into a World Capital,
renaming it New Noscow, while renming Moscow into Old Vasyuki. Here is
some text:

http://www.lib.ru/ILFPETROV/ilf_petr...ctures.html#91

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

THE INTERPLANETARY CHESS TOURNAMENT

A tall, thin, elderly man in a gold pince-nez and very dirty
paint-splashed boots had been walking about the town of Vasyuki since
early morning, attaching hand-written notices to walls. The notices
read:

On June 22,1927,
a lecture entitled

A FRUITFUL OPENING IDEA

will be given at the Cardboardworker Club
by Grossmeister (Grand Chess Master) O. Bender
after which he will play

A SIMULTANEOUS CHESS MATCH

on 160 boards

Admission . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 kopeks
Participation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50 kopeks
Commencement at 6 p.m. sharp
Bring your own chessboards
MANAGER : K. Michelson

The Grossmeister had not been wasting his time, either. Having
rented the club for three roubles, he hurried across to the chess
section, which for some reason or other was located in the corridor of
the horse-breeding administration.
In the chess section sat a one-eyed man reading a Panteleyev
edition of one of Spielhagen's novels.
"Grossmeister O. Bender!" announced Bender, sitting down on the
table. "I'm organizing a simultaneous chess match here."
The Vasyuki chess player's one eye opened as wide as its natural
limits would allow.
"One second, Comrade Grossmeister," he cried. "Take a seat, won't
you? I'll be back in a moment."
And the one-eyed man disappeared. Ostap looked around the
chess-section room. The walls were hung with photographs of racehorses;
on the table lay a dusty register marked "Achievements of the Vasyuki
Chess Section for 1925".
The one-eyed man returned with a dozen citizens of varying ages.
They all introduced themselves in turn and respectfully shook hands
with the Grossmeister.
"I'm on my way to Kazan," said Ostap abruptly. "Yes, yes, the
match is this evening. Do come along. I'm sorry, I'm not in form at the
moment. The Carlsbad tournament was tiring."
The Vasyuki chess players listened to him with filial love in
their eyes. Ostap was inspired, and felt a flood of new strength and
chess ideas.
"You wouldn't believe how far chess thinking has advanced," he
said. "Lasker, you know, has gone as far as trickery. It's impossible
to play him any more. He blows cigar smoke over his opponents and
smokes cheap cigars so that the smoke will be fouler. The chess world
is greatly concerned."
The Grossmeister then turned to more local affairs.
"Why aren't there any new ideas about in the province? Take, for
instance, your chess section. That's what it's called-the chess
section. That's boring, girls! Why don't you call it something else, in
true chess style? It would attract the trade-union masses into the
section. For example, you could call it The Four Knights Chess Club',
or The Red End-game', or 'A Decline in the Standard of Play with a Gain
in Pace'. That would be good. It has the right kind of sound."
The idea was successful.
"Indeed," exclaimed the citizens, "why shouldn't we rename our
section The Four Knights Chess Club'?"
Since the chess committee was there on the spot, Ostap organized
a one-minute meeting under his honorary chairmanship, and the chess
section was unanimously renamed The Four Knights Chess Club'.
Benefiting from his lessons aboard the Scriabin, the Grossmeister
artistically drew four knights and the appropriate caption on a sheet
of cardboard.
This important step promised the flowering of chess thought in
Vasyuki.
"Chess!" said Ostap. "Do you realize what chess is? It promotes
the advance of culture and also the economy. Do you realize that The
Four Knights Chess Club', given the right organization, could
completely transform the town of Vasyuki?"
Ostap had not eaten since the day before, which accounted for his
unusual eloquence.
"Yes," he cried, "chess enriches a country! If you agree to my
plan, you'll soon be descending marble steps to the quay! Vasyuki will
become the centre of ten provinces! What did you ever hear of the town
of Semmering before? Nothing! But now that miserable little town is
rich and famous just because an international tournament was held
there. That's why I say you should organize an international chess
tournament in Vasyuki."
"How?" they all cried.
"It's a perfectly practical plan," replied the Grossmeister. "My
connections and your activity are all that are required for an
international tournament in Vasyuki. Just think how fine that would
sound-The 1927 International Tournament to be held in Vasyuki!' Such
players as Jose-Raoul Capablanca, Lasker, Alekhine, Reti, Rubinstein,
Tarrasch, Widmar and Dr. Grigoryev are bound to come. What's more, I'll
take part myself!"
"But what about the money?" groaned the citizens. "They would all
have to be paid. Many thousands of roubles! Where would we get it?"
"A powerful hurricane takes everything into account," said Ostap.
"The money will come from collections."
"And who do you think is going to pay that kind of money? The
people of Vasyuki?"
"What do you mean, the people of Vasyuki? The people of Vasyuki
are not going to pay money, they're going to receive it. It's all
extremely simple. After all, chess enthusiasts will come from all over
the world to attend a tournament with such great champions. Hundreds of
thousands of people-well-to-do people-will head for Vasyuki. Naturally,
the river transport will not be able to cope with such a large number
of passengers. So the Ministry of Railways will have to build a main
line from Moscow to Vasyuki. That's one thing. Another is hotels and
skyscrapers to accommodate the visitors. The third thing is improvement
of the agriculture over a radius of five hundred miles; the visitors
have to be provided with fruit, vegetables, caviar and chocolate. The
building for the actual tournament is the next thing. Then there's
construction of garages to house motor transport for the visitors. An
extra-high power radio station will have to be built to broadcast the
sensational results of the tournament to the rest of the world. Now
about the Vasyuki railway. It most likely won't be able to carry all
the passengers wanting to come to Vasyuki, so we will have to have a
'Greater Vasyuki' airport with regular nights by mail planes and
airships to all parts of the globe, including Los Angeles and
Melbourne."
Dazzling vistas unfolded before the Vasyuki chess enthusiasts.
The walls of the room melted away. The rotting walls of the stud-farm
collapsed and in their place a thirty-storey building towered into the
sky. Every hall, every room, and even the lightning-fast lifts were
full of people thoughtfully playing chess on malachite encrusted
boards.
Marble steps led down to the blue Volga. Ocean-going steamers
were moored on the river. Cablecars communicating with the town centre
carried up heavy-faced foreigners, chess-playing ladies, Australian
advocates of the Indian defence, Hindus in turbans, devotees of the
Spanish gambit, Germans, Frenchmen, New Zealanders, inhabitants of the
Amazon basin, and finally Muscovites, citizens of Leningrad and Kiev,
Siberians and natives of Odessa, all envious of the citizens of
Vasyuki.
Lines of cars moved in between the marble hotels. Then suddenly
everything stopped. From out of the fashionable Pass Pawn Hotel came
the world champion Capablanca. He was surrounded by women. A militiaman
dressed in special chess uniform (check breeches and bishops in his
lapels) saluted smartly. The one-eyed president of the "Four Knights
Club" of Vasyuki approached the champion in a dignified manner.
The conversation between the two luminaries, conducted in
English, was interrupted by the arrival by air of Dr. Grigoryev and the
future world champion, Alekhine.
Cries of welcome shook the town. Capablanca glowered. At a wave
of one-eye's hand, a set of marble steps was run up to the plane. Dr.
Grigoryev came down, waving his hat and commenting, as he went, on a
possible mistake by Capablanca in his forthcoming match with Alekhine.
Suddenly a black dot was noticed on the horizon. It approached
rapidly, growing larger and larger until it finally turned into a large
emerald parachute. A man with an attache case was hanging from the
harness, like a huge radish.
"Here he is!" shouted one-eye. "Hooray, hooray, I recognize the
great philosopher and chess player Dr. Lasker. He is the only person in
the world who wears those green socks." Capablanca glowered again.
The marble steps were quickly brought up for Lasker to alight on,
and the cheerful ex-champion, blowing from his sleeve a speck of dust
which had settled on him over Silesia f ell into the arms of one-eye.
The latter put his arm around Lasker's waist and walked him over to the
champion, saying:
"Make up your quarrel! On behalf of the popular masses of
Vasyuki, I urge you to make up your quarrel."
Capablanca sighed loudly and, shaking hands with the veteran,
said: "I always admired your idea of moving QK5 to QB3 in the Spanish
gambit."
"Hooray!" exclaimed one-eye. "Simple and convincing in the style
of a champion."
And the incredible crowd joined in with: "Hooray! Vivat! Banzai!
Simple and convincing in the style of a champion!"
Express trains sped into the twelve Vasyuki stations, depositing
ever greater crowds of chess enthusiasts.
Hardly had the sky begun to glow from the brightly lit
advertisements, when a white horse was led through the streets of the
town. It was the only horse left after the mechanization of the town's
transportation. By special decree it had been renamed a stallion,
although it had actually been a mare the whole of its life. The lovers
of chess acclaimed it with palm leaves and chessboards.
"Don't worry," continued Ostap, "my scheme will guarantee the
town an unprecedented boom in your production forces. Just think what
will happen when the tournament is over and the visitors have left. The
citizens of Moscow, crowded together on account of the housing
shortage, will come flocking to your beautiful town. The capital will
be automatically transferred to Vasyuki. The government will move here.
Vasyuki will be renamed New Moscow, and Moscow will become Old Vasyuki.
The people of Leningrad and Kharkov will gnash their teeth in fury but
won't be able to do a thing about it. New Moscow will soon become the
most elegant city in Europe and, soon afterwards, in the whole world."
"The whole world!! I" gasped the citizens of Vasyuki in a daze.
"Yes, and, later on, in the universe. Chess thinking-which has
turned a regional centre into the capital of the world-will become an
applied science and will invent ways of interplanetary communication.
Signals will be sent from Vasyuki to Mars, Jupiter and Neptune.
Communications with Venus will be as easy as going from Rybinsk to
Yaroslavl. And then who knows what may happen? In maybe eight or so
years the first interplanetary chess tournament in the history of the
world will be held in Vasyuki."
Ostap wiped his noble brow. He was so hungry he could have eaten
a roasted knight from the chessboard.
"Ye-es," said the one-eyed man with a sigh, looking around the
dusty room with an insane light in his eye, "but how are we to put the
plan into effect, to lay the basis, so to say?"
They all looked at the Grossmelster tensely.
"As I say, in practice the plan depends entirely on your
activity. I will do all the organizing myself. There will be no actual
expense, except for the cost of the telegrams."
One-eyed nudged his companions. "Well?" he asked, "what do you
say?"
"Let's do it, let's do it!" cried the citizens.
"How much money is needed for the . . . er . . . telegrams?"
"A mere bagatelle. A hundred roubles."
"We only have twenty-one roubles in the cash box. We realize, of
course, that it is by no means enough . . ."
But the Grossmeister proved to be accommodating. "All right," he
said, "give me the twenty roubles."
"Will it be enough?" asked one-eye.
"It'll be enough for the initial telegrams. Later on we can start
collecting contributions. Then there'll be so much money we shan't know
what to do with it."
Putting the money away in his green field jacket, the
Grossmeister reminded the gathered citizens of his lecture and
simultaneous match on one hundred and sixty boards, and, taking leave
of them until evening, made his way to the Cardboard-worker Club to
find Ippolit Matveyevich.
"I'm starving," said Vorobyaninov in a tremulous voice.
He was already sitting at the window of the box office, but had
not collected one kopek; he could not even buy a hunk of bread. In
front of him lay a green wire basket intended for the money. It was the
kind that is used in middle-class houses to hold the cutlery.
"Listen, Vorobyaninov," said Ostap, "stop your cash transactions
for an hour and come and eat at the caterers' union canteen. I'll
describe the situation as we go. By the way, you need a shave and
brush-up. You look like a tramp. A Grossmeister cannot have such
suspicious-looking associates."
"I haven't sold a single ticket," Ippolit Matveyevich informed
him.
"Don't worry. People will come flocking in towards evening. The
town has already contributed twenty roubles for the organization of an
international chess tournament."
"Then why bother about the simultaneous match?" whispered his
manager. "You may lose the games anyway. With twenty roubles we can now
buy tickets for the ship-the Karl Liebknecht has just come in-travel
quietly to Stalingrad and wait for the theatre to arrive. We can
probably open the chairs there. Then we'll be rich and the world will
belong to us."
"You shouldn't say such silly things on an empty stomach. It has
a bad effect on the brain. We might reach Stalingrad on twenty roubles,
but what are we going to eat with? Vitamins, my dear comrade marshal,
are not given away free. On the other hand, we can get thirty roubles
out of the locals for the lecture and match."
"They'll slaughter us!" said Vorobyaninov.
"It's a risk, certainly. We may be manhandled a bit. But anyway,
I have a nice little plan which will save you, at least. But we can
talk about that later on. Meanwhile, let's go and try the local
dishes."
Towards six o'clock the Grossmeister, replete, freshly shaven,
and smelling of eau-de-Cologne, went into the box office of the
Cardboardworker Club.
Vorobyaninov, also freshly shaven, was busily selling tickets.
"How's it going? " asked the Grossmeister quietly.
"Thirty have gone in and twenty have paid to play," answered his
manager.
"Sixteen roubles. That's bad, that's bad!" -
"What do you mean, Bender? Just look at the number of people
standing in line. They're bound to beat us up."
"Don't think about it. When they hit you, you can cry. In the
meantime, don't dally. Learn to do business."
An hour later there were thirty-five roubles in the cash box. The
people in the clubroom were getting restless.
"Close the window and give me the money!" said Bender. "Now
listen! Here's five roubles. Go down to the quay, hire a boat for a
couple of hours, and wait for me by the riverside just below the
warehouse. We're going for an evening boat trip. Don't worry about me.
I'm in good form today."
The Grossmeister entered the clubroom. He felt in good spirits
and knew for certain that the first move-pawn to king four-would not
cause him any complications. The remaining moves were, admittedly,
rather more obscure, but that did not disturb the smooth operator in
the least. He had worked out a surprise plan to extract him from the
most hopeless game.
The Grossmeister was greeted with applause. The small club-room
was decorated with coloured flags left over from an evening held a week
before by the lifeguard rescue service. This was clear, furthermore,
from the slogan on the wall:

ASSISTANCE TO DROWNING PERSONS IS IN THEIR OWN HANDS

Ostap bowed, stretched out his hands as though restraining the
public from undeserved applause, and went up on to the dais.
"Comrades and brother chess players," he said in a fine speaking
voice: "the subject of my lecture today is one on which I spoke, not
without certain success, I may add, in Nizhni-Novgorod a week ago. The
subject of my lecture is 'A Fruitful Opening Idea'.
"What, Comrades, is an opening? And what, Comrades, is an idea?
An opening, Comrades, is quasi una fantasia. And what, Comrades, is an
idea? An idea, Comrades, is a human thought moulded in logical chess
form. Even with insignificant forces you can master the whole of the
chessboard. It all depends on each separate individual. Take, for
example, the fair-haired young man sitting in the third row. Let's
assume he plays well. . . ." The fair-haired young man turned red.
"And let's suppose that the brown-haired fellow over there
doesn't play very well."
Everyone turned around and looked at the brown-haired fellow.
"What do we see, Comrades? We see that the fair-haired fellow
plays well and that the other one plays badly. And no amount of
lecturing can change this correlation of forces unless each separate
individual keeps practising his dra-I mean chess. And now, Comrades, I
would like to tell you some instructive stories about our esteemed
ultramodernists, Capablanca, Lasker and Dr Grigoryev."
Ostap told the audience a few antiquated anecdotes, gleaned in
childhood from the Blue Magazine, and this completed the first half of
the evening.
The brevity of the lecture caused certain surprise. The one-eyed
man was keeping his single peeper firmly fixed on the Grossmeister.
The beginning of the simultaneous chess match, however, allayed
the one-eyed chess player's growing suspicions. Together with the rest,
he set up the tables along three sides of the room. Thirty enthusiasts
in all took their places to play the Grossmeister. Many of them were in
complete confusion and kept glancing at books on chess to refresh their
knowledge of complicated variations, with the help of which they hoped
not to have to resign before the twenty-second move, at least.
Ostap ran his eyes along the line of black chessmen surrounding
him on three sides, looked at the door, and then began the game. He
went up to the one-eyed man, who was sitting at the first board, and
moved the king's pawn forward two squares.
One-eye immediately seized hold of his ears and began thinking
hard.
A whisper passed along the line of players. "The Grossmeister has
played pawn to king four."
Ostap did not pamper his opponents with a variety of openings. On
the remaining twenty-nine boards he made the same move-pawn to king
four. One after another the enthusiasts seized their heads and launched
into feverish discussions. Those who were not playing followed the
Grossmeister with their eyes. The only amateur photographer in the town
was about to clamber on to a chair and light his magnesium flare when
Ostap waved his arms angrily and, breaking off his drift along the
boards, shouted loudly:
"Remove the photographer! He is disturbing my chess thought!"
What would be the point of leaving a photograph of myself in this
miserable town, thought Ostap to himself. I don't much like having
dealings with the militia.
Indignant hissing from the enthusiasts forced the photographer to
abandon his attempt. In fact, their annoyance was so great that he was
actually put outside the, door.
At the third move it became clear that in eighteen games the
Grossmeister was playing a Spanish gambit. In the other twelve the
blacks played the old-fashioned, though fairly reliable, Philidor
defence. If Ostap had known he was using such cunning gambits and
countering such tested defences, he would have been most surprised. The
truth of the matter was that he was playing chess for the second time
in his life.
At first the enthusiasts, and first and foremost one-eye, were
terrified at the Grossmeister's obvious craftiness.
With singular ease, and no doubt scoffing to himself at the
backwardness of the Vasyuki enthusiasts, the Grossmeister sacrificed
pawns and other pieces left and right. He even sacrificed his queen to
the brown-haired fellow whose skill had been so belittled during the
lecture. The man was horrified and about to resign; it was only by a
terrific effort of will that he was able to continue.
The storm broke about five minutes later. "Mate!" babbled the
brown-haired fellow, terrified out of his wits. "You're checkmate,
Comrade Grossmeister!'
Ostap analysed the situation, shamefully called a rook a "castle"
and pompously congratulated the fellow on his win. A hum broke out
among the enthusiasts.
Time to push off, thought Ostap, serenely wandering up and down
the rows of tables and casually moving pieces about.
"You've moved the knight wrong, Comrade Grossmeister," said
one-eye, cringing. "A knight doesn't go like that."
"So sorry," said the Grossmeister, "I'm rather tired after the
lecture."
During the next ten minutes the Grossmeister lost a further ten
games.
Cries of surprise echoed through the Cardboardworker club-room.
Conflict was near. Ostap lost fifteen games in succession, and then
another three.
Only one-eye was left. At the beginning of the game he had made a
large number of mistakes from nervousness and was only now bringing the
game to a victorious conclusion. Unnoticed by those around, Ostap
removed the black rook from the board and hid it in his pocket.
A crowd of people pressed tightly around the players.
"I had a rook on this square a moment ago," cried one-eye,
looking round, "and now it's gone!"
"If it's not there now, it wasn't there at all," said Ostap,
rather rudely.
"Of course it was. I remember it distinctly!"
"Of course it wasn't!"
"Where's it gone, then? Did you take it?"
"Yes, I took it."
"At which move?"
"Don't try to confuse me with your rook. If you want to resign,
say so!"
"Wait a moment, Comrades, I have all the moves written down."
"Written down my foot!"
"This is disgraceful!" yelled one-eye. "Give me back the rook!"
"Come on, resign, and stop this fooling about."
"Give me back my rook!"
At this point the Grossmeister, realizing that procrastination
was the thief of time, seized a handful of chessmen and threw them in
his one-eyed opponent's face.
"Comrades!" shrieked one-eye. "Look, everyone, he's hitting an
amateur!"
The chess players of Vasyuki were aghast.
Without wasting valuable time, Ostap hurled a chessboard at the
lamp and, hitting out at jaws and faces in the ensuing darkness, ran
out into the street. The Vasyuki chess enthusiasts, falling over each
other, tore after him.

wrote:
Those who have followed Ilymzhinov's attmepts to make his town of
Elista into Chess City, should know that Ilymzhinov is following the
text of the most famous Russian satire novel Twelve Chairs, written in
the 1920s. In one episode, the main hero, a brilliant swiddler Ostap
Bender, who needs money desperately, pretends to be a chess grandmaster
and gives a paid lecture to the local chess enthusiasts at the
porvincial town of Vasyuki. In it he goess off and starts presenting a
grandious plan how chess can turn Vasyuki into a World Capital,
renaming it New Noscow, while renming Moscow into Old Vasyuki. Here is
some text:

http://www.lib.ru/ILFPETROV/ilf_petr...ctures.html#91

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

THE INTERPLANETARY CHESS TOURNAMENT

A tall, thin, elderly man in a gold pince-nez and very dirty
paint-splashed boots had been walking about the town of Vasyuki since
early morning, attaching hand-written notices to walls. The notices
read:

On June 22,1927,
a lecture entitled

A FRUITFUL OPENING IDEA

will be given at the Cardboardworker Club
by Grossmeister (Grand Chess Master) O. Bender
after which he will play

A SIMULTANEOUS CHESS MATCH

on 160 boards

Admission . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 kopeks
Participation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50 kopeks
Commencement at 6 p.m. sharp
Bring your own chessboards
MANAGER : K. Michelson

The Grossmeister


That's Grandmaster....


had not been wasting his time, either. Having
rented the club for three roubles, he hurried across to the chess
section, which for some reason or other was located in the corridor of
the horse-breeding administration.
In the chess section sat a one-eyed man reading a Panteleyev
edition of one of Spielhagen's novels.
"Grossmeister O. Bender!" announced Bender, sitting down on the
table. "I'm organizing a simultaneous chess match here."
The Vasyuki chess player's one eye opened as wide as its natural
limits would allow.
"One second, Comrade Grossmeister," he cried. "Take a seat, won't
you? I'll be back in a moment."
And the one-eyed man disappeared. Ostap looked around the
chess-section room. The walls were hung with photographs of racehorses;
on the table lay a dusty register marked "Achievements of the Vasyuki
Chess Section for 1925".
The one-eyed man returned with a dozen citizens of varying ages.
They all introduced themselves in turn and respectfully shook hands
with the Grossmeister.
"I'm on my way to Kazan," said Ostap abruptly. "Yes, yes, the
match is this evening. Do come along. I'm sorry, I'm not in form at the
moment. The Carlsbad tournament was tiring."
The Vasyuki chess players listened to him with filial love in
their eyes. Ostap was inspired, and felt a flood of new strength and
chess ideas.
"You wouldn't believe how far chess thinking has advanced," he
said. "Lasker, you know, has gone as far as trickery. It's impossible
to play him any more. He blows cigar smoke over his opponents and
smokes cheap cigars so that the smoke will be fouler. The chess world
is greatly concerned."
The Grossmeister then turned to more local affairs.
"Why aren't there any new ideas about in the province? Take, for
instance, your chess section. That's what it's called-the chess
section. That's boring, girls! Why don't you call it something else, in
true chess style? It would attract the trade-union masses into the
section. For example, you could call it The Four Knights Chess Club',
or The Red End-game', or 'A Decline in the Standard of Play with a Gain
in Pace'.


"Loss of Quality with a Gain of Tempo".

(Loss of quality: bishop/knight for rook)

What a lousy translation....


That would be good. It has the right kind of sound."
The idea was successful.
"Indeed," exclaimed the citizens, "why shouldn't we rename our
section The Four Knights Chess Club'?"
Since the chess committee was there on the spot, Ostap organized
a one-minute meeting under his honorary chairmanship, and the chess
section was unanimously renamed The Four Knights Chess Club'.
Benefiting from his lessons aboard the Scriabin, the Grossmeister
artistically drew four knights and the appropriate caption on a sheet
of cardboard.
This important step promised the flowering of chess thought in
Vasyuki.
"Chess!" said Ostap. "Do you realize what chess is? It promotes
the advance of culture and also the economy. Do you realize that The
Four Knights Chess Club', given the right organization, could
completely transform the town of Vasyuki?"
Ostap had not eaten since the day before, which accounted for his
unusual eloquence.
"Yes," he cried, "chess enriches a country! If you agree to my
plan, you'll soon be descending marble steps to the quay! Vasyuki will
become the centre of ten provinces! What did you ever hear of the town
of Semmering before? Nothing! But now that miserable little town is
rich and famous just because an international tournament was held
there. That's why I say you should organize an international chess
tournament in Vasyuki."
"How?" they all cried.
"It's a perfectly practical plan," replied the Grossmeister. "My
connections and your activity are all that are required for an
international tournament in Vasyuki. Just think how fine that would
sound-The 1927 International Tournament to be held in Vasyuki!' Such
players as Jose-Raoul Capablanca, Lasker, Alekhine, Reti, Rubinstein,
Tarrasch, Widmar and Dr. Grigoryev are bound to come. What's more, I'll
take part myself!"
"But what about the money?" groaned the citizens. "They would all
have to be paid. Many thousands of roubles! Where would we get it?"
"A powerful hurricane takes everything into account," said Ostap.
"The money will come from collections."
"And who do you think is going to pay that kind of money? The
people of Vasyuki?"
"What do you mean, the people of Vasyuki? The people of Vasyuki
are not going to pay money, they're going to receive it. It's all
extremely simple. After all, chess enthusiasts will come from all over
the world to attend a tournament with such great champions. Hundreds of
thousands of people-well-to-do people-will head for Vasyuki. Naturally,
the river transport will not be able to cope with such a large number
of passengers. So the Ministry of Railways will have to build a main
line from Moscow to Vasyuki. That's one thing. Another is hotels and
skyscrapers to accommodate the visitors. The third thing is improvement
of the agriculture over a radius of five hundred miles; the visitors
have to be provided with fruit, vegetables, caviar and chocolate. The
building for the actual tournament is the next thing. Then there's
construction of garages to house motor transport for the visitors. An
extra-high power radio station will have to be built to broadcast the
sensational results of the tournament to the rest of the world. Now
about the Vasyuki railway. It most likely won't be able to carry all
the passengers wanting to come to Vasyuki, so we will have to have a
'Greater Vasyuki' airport with regular nights by mail planes and
airships to all parts of the globe, including Los Angeles and
Melbourne."
Dazzling vistas unfolded before the Vasyuki chess enthusiasts.
The walls of the room melted away. The rotting walls of the stud-farm
collapsed and in their place a thirty-storey building towered into the
sky. Every hall, every room, and even the lightning-fast lifts were
full of people thoughtfully playing chess on malachite encrusted
boards.
Marble steps led down to the blue Volga. Ocean-going steamers
were moored on the river. Cablecars communicating with the town centre
carried up heavy-faced foreigners, chess-playing ladies, Australian
advocates of the Indian defence, Hindus in turbans, devotees of the
Spanish gambit, Germans, Frenchmen, New Zealanders, inhabitants of the
Amazon basin, and finally Muscovites, citizens of Leningrad and Kiev,
Siberians and natives of Odessa, all envious of the citizens of
Vasyuki.
Lines of cars moved in between the marble hotels. Then suddenly
everything stopped. From out of the fashionable Pass Pawn Hotel came
the world champion Capablanca. He was surrounded by women. A militiaman
dressed in special chess uniform (check breeches and bishops in his
lapels) saluted smartly. The one-eyed president of the "Four Knights
Club" of Vasyuki approached the champion in a dignified manner.
The conversation between the two luminaries, conducted in
English, was interrupted by the arrival by air of Dr. Grigoryev and the
future world champion, Alekhine.
Cries of welcome shook the town. Capablanca glowered. At a wave
of one-eye's hand, a set of marble steps was run up to the plane. Dr.
Grigoryev came down, waving his hat and commenting, as he went, on a
possible mistake by Capablanca in his forthcoming match with Alekhine.
Suddenly a black dot was noticed on the horizon. It approached
rapidly, growing larger and larger until it finally turned into a large
emerald parachute. A man with an attache case was hanging from the
harness, like a huge radish.
"Here he is!" shouted one-eye. "Hooray, hooray, I recognize the
great philosopher and chess player Dr. Lasker. He is the only person in
the world who wears those green socks." Capablanca glowered again.
The marble steps were quickly brought up for Lasker to alight on,
and the cheerful ex-champion, blowing from his sleeve a speck of dust
which had settled on him over Silesia f ell into the arms of one-eye.
The latter put his arm around Lasker's waist and walked him over to the
champion, saying:
"Make up your quarrel! On behalf of the popular masses of
Vasyuki, I urge you to make up your quarrel."
Capablanca sighed loudly and, shaking hands with the veteran,
said: "I always admired your idea of moving QK5 to QB3 in the Spanish
gambit."
"Hooray!" exclaimed one-eye. "Simple and convincing in the style
of a champion."
And the incredible crowd joined in with: "Hooray! Vivat! Banzai!
Simple and convincing in the style of a champion!"
Express trains sped into the twelve Vasyuki stations, depositing
ever greater crowds of chess enthusiasts.
Hardly had the sky begun to glow from the brightly lit
advertisements, when a white horse was led through the streets of the
town. It was the only horse left after the mechanization of the town's
transportation. By special decree it had been renamed a stallion,
although it had actually been a mare the whole of its life. The lovers
of chess acclaimed it with palm leaves and chessboards.
"Don't worry," continued Ostap, "my scheme will guarantee the
town an unprecedented boom in your production forces. Just think what
will happen when the tournament is over and the visitors have left. The
citizens of Moscow, crowded together on account of the housing
shortage, will come flocking to your beautiful town. The capital will
be automatically transferred to Vasyuki. The government will move here.
Vasyuki will be renamed New Moscow, and Moscow will become Old Vasyuki.
The people of Leningrad and Kharkov will gnash their teeth in fury but
won't be able to do a thing about it. New Moscow will soon become the
most elegant city in Europe and, soon afterwards, in the whole world."
"The whole world!! I" gasped the citizens of Vasyuki in a daze.
"Yes, and, later on, in the universe. Chess thinking-which has
turned a regional centre into the capital of the world-will become an
applied science and will invent ways of interplanetary communication.
Signals will be sent from Vasyuki to Mars, Jupiter and Neptune.
Communications with Venus will be as easy as going from Rybinsk to
Yaroslavl. And then who knows what may happen? In maybe eight or so
years the first interplanetary chess tournament in the history of the
world will be held in Vasyuki."
Ostap wiped his noble brow. He was so hungry he could have eaten
a roasted knight from the chessboard.
"Ye-es," said the one-eyed man with a sigh, looking around the
dusty room with an insane light in his eye, "but how are we to put the
plan into effect, to lay the basis, so to say?"
They all looked at the Grossmelster tensely.
"As I say, in practice the plan depends entirely on your
activity. I will do all the organizing myself. There will be no actual
expense, except for the cost of the telegrams."
One-eyed nudged his companions. "Well?" he asked, "what do you
say?"
"Let's do it, let's do it!" cried the citizens.
"How much money is needed for the . . . er . . . telegrams?"
"A mere bagatelle. A hundred roubles."
"We only have twenty-one roubles in the cash box. We realize, of
course, that it is by no means enough . . ."
But the Grossmeister proved to be accommodating. "All right," he
said, "give me the twenty roubles."
"Will it be enough?" asked one-eye.
"It'll be enough for the initial telegrams. Later on we can start
collecting contributions. Then there'll be so much money we shan't know
what to do with it."
Putting the money away in his green field jacket, the
Grossmeister reminded the gathered citizens of his lecture and
simultaneous match on one hundred and sixty boards, and, taking leave
of them until evening, made his way to the Cardboard-worker Club to
find Ippolit Matveyevich.
"I'm starving," said Vorobyaninov in a tremulous voice.
He was already sitting at the window of the box office, but had
not collected one kopek; he could not even buy a hunk of bread. In
front of him lay a green wire basket intended for the money. It was the
kind that is used in middle-class houses to hold the cutlery.
"Listen, Vorobyaninov," said Ostap, "stop your cash transactions
for an hour and come and eat at the caterers' union canteen. I'll
describe the situation as we go. By the way, you need a shave and
brush-up. You look like a tramp. A Grossmeister cannot have such
suspicious-looking associates."
"I haven't sold a single ticket," Ippolit Matveyevich informed
him.
"Don't worry. People will come flocking in towards evening. The
town has already contributed twenty roubles for the organization of an
international chess tournament."
"Then why bother about the simultaneous match?" whispered his
manager. "You may lose the games anyway. With twenty roubles we can now
buy tickets for the ship-the Karl Liebknecht has just come in-travel
quietly to Stalingrad and wait for the theatre to arrive. We can
probably open the chairs there. Then we'll be rich and the world will
belong to us."
"You shouldn't say such silly things on an empty stomach. It has
a bad effect on the brain. We might reach Stalingrad on twenty roubles,
but what are we going to eat with? Vitamins, my dear comrade marshal,
are not given away free. On the other hand, we can get thirty roubles
out of the locals for the lecture and match."
"They'll slaughter us!" said Vorobyaninov.
"It's a risk, certainly. We may be manhandled a bit. But anyway,
I have a nice little plan which will save you, at least. But we can
talk about that later on. Meanwhile, let's go and try the local
dishes."
Towards six o'clock the Grossmeister, replete, freshly shaven,
and smelling of eau-de-Cologne, went into the box office of the
Cardboardworker Club.
Vorobyaninov, also freshly shaven, was busily selling tickets.
"How's it going? " asked the Grossmeister quietly.
"Thirty have gone in and twenty have paid to play," answered his
manager.
"Sixteen roubles. That's bad, that's bad!" -
"What do you mean, Bender? Just look at the number of people
standing in line. They're bound to beat us up."
"Don't think about it. When they hit you, you can cry. In the
meantime, don't dally. Learn to do business."
An hour later there were thirty-five roubles in the cash box. The
people in the clubroom were getting restless.
"Close the window and give me the money!" said Bender. "Now
listen! Here's five roubles. Go down to the quay, hire a boat for a
couple of hours, and wait for me by the riverside just below the
warehouse. We're going for an evening boat trip. Don't worry about me.
I'm in good form today."
The Grossmeister entered the clubroom. He felt in good spirits
and knew for certain that the first move-pawn to king four-would not
cause him any complications. The remaining moves were, admittedly,
rather more obscure, but that did not disturb the smooth operator in
the least. He had worked out a surprise plan to extract him from the
most hopeless game.
The Grossmeister was greeted with applause. The small club-room
was decorated with coloured flags left over from an evening held a week
before by the lifeguard rescue service. This was clear, furthermore,
from the slogan on the wall:

ASSISTANCE TO DROWNING PERSONS IS IN THEIR OWN HANDS

Ostap bowed, stretched out his hands as though restraining the
public from undeserved applause, and went up on to the dais.
"Comrades and brother chess players," he said in a fine speaking
voice: "the subject of my lecture today is one on which I spoke, not
without certain success, I may add, in Nizhni-Novgorod a week ago. The
subject of my lecture is 'A Fruitful Opening Idea'.
"What, Comrades, is an opening? And what, Comrades, is an idea?
An opening, Comrades, is quasi una fantasia. And what, Comrades, is an
idea? An idea, Comrades, is a human thought moulded in logical chess
form. Even with insignificant forces you can master the whole of the
chessboard. It all depends on each separate individual. Take, for
example, the fair-haired young man sitting in the third row. Let's
assume he plays well. . . ." The fair-haired young man turned red.
"And let's suppose that the brown-haired fellow over there
doesn't play very well."
Everyone turned around and looked at the brown-haired fellow.
"What do we see, Comrades? We see that the fair-haired fellow
plays well and that the other one plays badly. And no amount of
lecturing can change this correlation of forces unless each separate
individual keeps practising his dra-I mean chess. And now, Comrades, I
would like to tell you some instructive stories about our esteemed
ultramodernists, Capablanca, Lasker and Dr Grigoryev."
Ostap told the audience a few antiquated anecdotes, gleaned in
childhood from the Blue Magazine, and this completed the first half of
the evening.
The brevity of the lecture caused certain surprise. The one-eyed
man was keeping his single peeper firmly fixed on the Grossmeister.
The beginning of the simultaneous chess match, however, allayed
the one-eyed chess player's growing suspicions. Together with the rest,
he set up the tables along three sides of the room. Thirty enthusiasts
in all took their places to play the Grossmeister. Many of them were in
complete confusion and kept glancing at books on chess to refresh their
knowledge of complicated variations, with the help of which they hoped
not to have to resign before the twenty-second move, at least.
Ostap ran his eyes along the line of black chessmen surrounding
him on three sides, looked at the door, and then began the game. He
went up to the one-eyed man, who was sitting at the first board, and
moved the king's pawn forward two squares.
One-eye immediately seized hold of his ears and began thinking
hard.
A whisper passed along the line of players. "The Grossmeister has
played pawn to king four."
Ostap did not pamper his opponents with a variety of openings. On
the remaining twenty-nine boards he made the same move-pawn to king
four. One after another the enthusiasts seized their heads and launched
into feverish discussions. Those who were not playing followed the
Grossmeister with their eyes. The only amateur photographer in the town
was about to clamber on to a chair and light his magnesium flare when
Ostap waved his arms angrily and, breaking off his drift along the
boards, shouted loudly:
"Remove the photographer! He is disturbing my chess thought!"
What would be the point of leaving a photograph of myself in this
miserable town, thought Ostap to himself. I don't much like having
dealings with the militia.
Indignant hissing from the enthusiasts forced the photographer to
abandon his attempt. In fact, their annoyance was so great that he was
actually put outside the, door.
At the third move it became clear that in eighteen games the
Grossmeister was playing a Spanish gambit. In the other twelve the
blacks played the old-fashioned, though fairly reliable, Philidor
defence. If Ostap had known he was using such cunning gambits and
countering such tested defences, he would have been most surprised. The
truth of the matter was that he was playing chess for the second time
in his life.
At first the enthusiasts, and first and foremost one-eye, were
terrified at the Grossmeister's obvious craftiness.
With singular ease, and no doubt scoffing to himself at the
backwardness of the Vasyuki enthusiasts, the Grossmeister sacrificed
pawns and other pieces left and right. He even sacrificed his queen to
the brown-haired fellow whose skill had been so belittled during the
lecture. The man was horrified and about to resign; it was only by a
terrific effort of will that he was able to continue.
The storm broke about five minutes later. "Mate!" babbled the
brown-haired fellow, terrified out of his wits. "You're checkmate,
Comrade Grossmeister!'
Ostap analysed the situation, shamefully called a rook a "castle"
and pompously congratulated the fellow on his win. A hum broke out
among the enthusiasts.
Time to push off, thought Ostap, serenely wandering up and down
the rows of tables and casually moving pieces about.
"You've moved the knight wrong, Comrade Grossmeister," said
one-eye, cringing. "A knight doesn't go like that."
"So sorry," said the Grossmeister, "I'm rather tired after the
lecture."
During the next ten minutes the Grossmeister lost a further ten
games.
Cries of surprise echoed through the Cardboardworker club-room.
Conflict was near. Ostap lost fifteen games in succession, and then
another three.
Only one-eye was left. At the beginning of the game he had made a
large number of mistakes from nervousness and was only now bringing the
game to a victorious conclusion. Unnoticed by those around, Ostap
removed the black rook from the board and hid it in his pocket.
A crowd of people pressed tightly around the players.
"I had a rook on this square a moment ago," cried one-eye,
looking round, "and now it's gone!"
"If it's not there now, it wasn't there at all," said Ostap,
rather rudely.
"Of course it was. I remember it distinctly!"
"Of course it wasn't!"
"Where's it gone, then? Did you take it?"
"Yes, I took it."
"At which move?"
"Don't try to confuse me with your rook. If you want to resign,
say so!"
"Wait a moment, Comrades, I have all the moves written down."
"Written down my foot!"
"This is disgraceful!" yelled one-eye. "Give me back the rook!"
"Come on, resign, and stop this fooling about."
"Give me back my rook!"
At this point the Grossmeister, realizing that procrastination
was the thief of time, seized a handful of chessmen and threw them in
his one-eyed opponent's face.
"Comrades!" shrieked one-eye. "Look, everyone, he's hitting an
amateur!"
The chess players of Vasyuki were aghast.
Without wasting valuable time, Ostap hurled a chessboard at the
lamp and, hitting out at jaws and faces in the ensuing darkness, ran
out into the street. The Vasyuki chess enthusiasts, falling over each
other, tore after him.

On Oct 23, 1:48 am, wrote:
"Loss of Quality with a Gain of Tempo".

(Loss of quality: bishop/knight for rook)

What a lousy translation....

True, but the material imbalance of a rook for a minor piece, which
in English is called "the Exchange," is I believe called by the
equivalent of "the quality" in some other languages. For example, if
memory serves, it's called "la calidad" in Spanish. Perhaps those
fluent in other languages can tell us here by what other names it is
known.

Uzytkownik "Taylor Kingston" napisal w wiadomosci
oups.com...


On Oct 23, 1:48 am, wrote:
"Loss of Quality with a Gain of Tempo".

(Loss of quality: bishop/knight for rook)

What a lousy translation....

Nonetheless it is a literature classics :-)


True, but the material imbalance of a rook for a minor piece, which
in English is called "the Exchange," is I believe called by the
equivalent of "the quality" in some other languages. For example, if
memory serves, it's called "la calidad" in Spanish. Perhaps those
fluent in other languages can tell us here by what other names it is
known.


In Russian a sacrifice of a rook for a bishop or a knight is called
sometimes a sacrifice of a quality i.e. "zhertva katchestva". The same is in
Polish, maybe after Russian chess literature.

Taylor Kingston wrote:
On Oct 23, 1:48 am, wrote:
"Loss of Quality with a Gain of Tempo".

(Loss of quality: bishop/knight for rook)

What a lousy translation....

True, but the material imbalance of a rook for a minor piece, which
in English is called "the Exchange," is I believe called by the
equivalent of "the quality" in some other languages. For example, if
memory serves, it's called "la calidad" in Spanish. Perhaps those
fluent in other languages can tell us here by what other names it is
known.


Yes, but "Loss of Quality with a Gain of Tempo" is **my*** translation.
The original translator wrote: 'A Decline in the Standard of Play with
a Gain in Pace', which is nonsense.

Jerzy wrote:
Uzytkownik "Taylor Kingston" napisal w wiadomosci
oups.com...


On Oct 23, 1:48 am, wrote:
"Loss of Quality with a Gain of Tempo".

(Loss of quality: bishop/knight for rook)

What a lousy translation....

Nonetheless it is a literature classics :-)


The original, not the transation.


True, but the material imbalance of a rook for a minor piece, which
in English is called "the Exchange," is I believe called by the
equivalent of "the quality" in some other languages. For example, if
memory serves, it's called "la calidad" in Spanish. Perhaps those
fluent in other languages can tell us here by what other names it is
known.


In Russian a sacrifice of a rook for a bishop or a knight is called
sometimes a sacrifice of a quality i.e. "zhertva katchestva". The same is in
Polish, maybe after Russian chess literature.

napisal(a):

(Loss of quality: bishop/knight for rook)

What a lousy translation....

Nonetheless it is a literature classics :-)


The original, not the transation.


That`s why I prefer reading books in their original language :-)