Many years ago, I read somewhere that one of the reasons Fine declined
to take part in the '48 tournament was that he lost a training match
to Herman Steiner. Is this true? Were the games ever published? Are
the games available? Thanks in advance..!! warm regards, GreyHipster

p.s. I remember how nearly everone, including me, hated Fine's book
on the Fischer/Spassky match. Now it seems to me that Fine's analysis
may have had a kernel of truth....

p.s. I remember how nearly everone, including me, hated Fine's book
on the Fischer/Spassky match. Now it seems to me that Fine's analysis
may have had a kernel of truth....


I haven't read Fine's book on the Fischer/Spassky match, but after doing
a quick search on the web I found a review on www.jeremysilman.com. I
had never looked at silman's site before, but found a considerable
amount of interesting chess information there.

Marty

I think the real question is how Fine would have done in that tourney.I believe
with Fine in the tourney it would have been more difficult for Botvinnik to
win.Too bad Fine (that is too bad for the world of chess) chose a career in
Psychology instead of going for the World Championships.I am of the opinion
that Fine was no worst than #2 in the World 1937-38..

(Etj718) wrote in message ...
I think the real question is how Fine would have done in that tourney.I believe
with Fine in the tourney it would have been more difficult for Botvinnik to
win.Too bad Fine (that is too bad for the world of chess) chose a career in
Psychology instead of going for the World Championships.I am of the opinion
that Fine was no worst than #2 in the World 1937-38..

I believe Fine was quoted somewhere as saying he was not invited. I
have to wonder if someone spoke on his behalf that he was engaged in
doctoral studies and if it was *assumed* he would not be able to
participate.

David Ames

FINE DECLINED HIS INVITATION

By Larry Parr

I believe Fine was quoted somewhere as saying he was not invited. -- David
Ames

The best analysis of this whole sorry episode is in THE TRAGEDY OF PAUL
KERES by GM Larry Evans (see Chess Life, October 1996).

Some excerpts: "Fine declined to spend three months of his life watching
Russians throw games to each other...History proved Fine right. In Sports
Illustrated Bobby Fischer blasted Soviet stars for ganging up against him at
Curacao 1962. 'I had the best score of anyone who didn't cheat,' he
said....Botvinnik was then absolute champion of the Soviet Union (which had
swallowed Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia) while Keres was in trouble for having
competed in Nazi-organized tournaments during the war. The KGB wanted to
execute Keres for treason, and his family was also in peril. His case was
examined at the highest level in the Kremlin; they let him rejoin his family in
Estonia, but the price of his reprieve was to abandon his quest for the crown.
We have since learned that such dirty deals were not uncommon in totalitarian
regimes....Defector Viktor Korchnoi's family was released from Russia only
after he lost two title matches to Anatoly Karpov in 1978 and 1981....The
answer to whether the games were rigged exists not only in the KGB files but
also in the games themselves...Keres lost the first four games and won the
fifth only after Botvinnik had a commanding lead. Close analysis of these games
leaves little doubt that Keres was forced to take a dive. Pravda hailed
Botvinnik's triumph in 1948 as 'a victory of socialist culture,' yet both
Smyslov and Keres refused to shake his hand before it began...It's not my
intention here to analyze the Keres-Botvinnik games in any great detail.
Instead, I propose to pinpoint moves that strike me as suspicious with
diagrams, in all five of their skirmishes...Who wouldn't throw games to save
his life or his family?"

David Ames wrote I believe Fine was quoted
somewhere as saying he was not invited. I
have to wonder if someone spoke on his behalf that he was engaged in
doctoral studies and if it was *assumed* he would not be able to
participate.

David Ames

From "World Chess Championship Botvinnik To Kasparov" by Wade, Whiteley and
Keene:

"However, the agreed starting date, 2 March 1948, conflicted with Fine's
professional commitments. Lacking the financial backing of his compatriot
Reshevsky, Fine chose to put his career first and dropped out."

From "The Oxford Companion To Chess" by Hooper and Whyld:

"Fine was faced with a difficult choice. Having found chess unprofitable he
had long been studying for a profession (psychoanalysis) and the tournament
would have clashed with preparations for his final examinations. He declined
to play, passed his exams, and set up a practice in Manhattan. No doubt this
was the right decision, since he had passed his peak as a player, but later
he fostered the idea that he had been prevented from playing."

John Watson
Cumbernauld, Scotland
(No, NOT the author and IM!!)

_
"... a natural solution suggested itself
with a tournament composed of the surviving
AVRO contingent. Unespectedly Smyslov
replaced Flohr ... the tournament was to
be played in Holland in the spring of 1947.
... A Dutch newspaper published the charge,
later often repeated, that the Soviet
players would throw their games to one
another in order to allow a Soviet master
to become world champion. ... The Soviet
government, knowing full well what the
answer would be, then demanded that the
Dutch government censor its newspapers.
When the Dutch refused, the Soviets, in
retaliation, withdrew from the tournament.
... The result was a rescheduling of the
tournament for the following year, with
the vital difference that now half was to
be played in Holland, half in the
U. S. S. R. Dissatisfied with this
arrangement and the general tenor of the
event, I withdrew. (Incidentally, there
was no real financial compensation offered
to any of the Western players, who, unlike
their Soviet counterparts, were totally
unsubsidized.) ... Botvinnik, playing in
brilliant style, carried off first prize.
However, his surprising loss to Keres in
the last round, allowing the Soviet
grandmaster to finish in a tie for third
with Reshevsky, looked very suspicious.
... In 1948 I took my doctorate in
psychology and have been a practicing
psychologist ever since." - Fine

For details about 1946-1948, see the Edward Winter
Chess Notes feature (3006, 3018, 3028, 3048, and
3057).

http://www.chesscafe.com/winter/winter.htm