Crazy chess players
This is an article I originally published in November 2004. I’m reposting it because the recent post about Bobby Fisher reminded me of it.
If you don’t know, a Grandmaster ranking is the highest ranking in chess. It goes in this order: Expert -> Master -> International Master -> Grandmaster.
I am only an expert.
There are currently only a little over 500 grandmasters in the world.
And one of them just head butted a police officer.
I played in a tournament once when a Russian chess master punched another player in the face while they were playing. I was playing my game when suddenly I heard the commotion of pieces being knocked over and some shouting. The guy who was punched screamed “I’ll sue!!”
There is a much higher percentage of insanity among chess players than with the general population. Besides the obvious example, Bobby Fischer, American world champion Paul Morphy also went nuts. Towards the end of his life, he liked to arrange women’s shoes in a half-circle in the middle of the floor. When asked why he did this, he replied “because it looks pretty.”
Former world champion Wilhelm Steinitz believed he could move pieces through mental telepathy and died in an insane asylum.
US Champion and blindfold great Harry Pillsbury died broke and insane.
Blindfold chess was outlawed in Russia because they thought it drove people nuts.
Another great player, Aaron Nimzowitsch, was not completely insane, but he was a bit “given to bizarre behavior.” For example, in the middle of a complicated position once, he went to the corner of the room and stood on his head.
Mexican grandmaster, Carlos Torre, stripped naked on a New York bus. He had the habit of walking around nude and was once picked up for running down Fifth Avenue in New York in the nude. He was addicted to pineapple sundaes and consumed 15 a day.
The Polish master Paulino Frydman represented his country in seven chess olympiads. He liked to clear out hotels by running down the halls in his underwear yelling, “Fire!”
One of the best players of all time, Akiba Rubinstein, had a mental disorder his entire life. His wife warned many potential visitors, “Do not stay long, for if you do stay too long he will leave by way of the window.”
World champion Alexander Alekhine married four times to women 20 to 30 years older than he. He named his cat “chess,” played in chess events completely drunk, and sometimes urinated on the floor at these events.
