The latest of an occasional series in which Kingston members and friends of the club choose the player who has most inspired them. This profile is being published in three parts over the course of a month, building to a comprehensive overview of the life and career of the 10th world champion
Part 1: The young attacking genius
“Boris Spassky has had a curiously uneven chess career for a world title-holder,” said Leonard Barden in the foreword to Bernard Cafferty’s 1972 book, Master of Tactics. “Teenage prodigy, junior world champion and the youngest ever qualifier for an interzonal at 18 (Fischer later lowered the record), Spassky was already the crown prince of international chess before he was 20. Then came years of disappointments, quarrels with his trainer and chess officials, and divorce before a second surge carried Boris to the summit in 1969.”
When Spassky was playing his first world championship match against Tigran Petrosian in 1966, my best friend at school and I decided to play our own match concurrently. We played on a travelling set on our daily train journeys; I wanted the Spassky role and he preferred to be Petrosian. Unlike the real match, “Spassky” defeated “Petrosian” in our contest.
I think one of my reasons for liking Spassky was his advocacy of the Kings Gambit. My first game with it was in a Glasgow Schools Congress. I was losing at move five, winning at move 11, but lost in 23. In contrast, Spassky’s record in the gambit was remarkable, playing 30 games without loss at the top level, defeating Fischer, Karpov, Portisch and Bronstein amongst others. This Bronstein game was used in the Bond film From Russia with Love:
Boris Vasilievich Spassky was born on 30 January 1937 in Leningrad, from whence the family were evacuated after the German invasion. He learned chess at the age of five while billeted in a house with older children. Returning to Leningrad after the war, Boris began to visit a summer chess pavilion, at first watching as a spectator before playing. He recalled that there was little food at that time and he would spend all day there, being devastated when it closed in September.
The following year he joined the Palace of Pioneers, where he met met his first chess trainer Vladimir Zak. Genna Sosonko tells how Spassky credited Zak not only with teaching him the King’s Gambit and introducing him to opera and the works of Mark Twain, but also arranging financial support for his family. At the age of 10, he defeated Mikhail Botvinnik in a simultaneous. In discussing his style, Garry Kasparov suggests that Spassky liked a strong, mobile centre and free development, with Zak cultivating his attacking prowess. I think this game – played by 12-year-old Boris – is a good example.
In 1951 Spassky changed his trainer, replacing the able pedogogue Zak with the attacking genius Alexander Tolush. They had first met in 1947 in the Palace of Pioneers when young Boris, given the responsibility of transmitting the moves in a telegraph match, was also given the honour of going to the buffet to buy Tolush more cigarettes. Valentina, Tolush’s wife, recalled that having no children of their own, they regarded Borya as their son.
Viktor Korchnoi, who had turned down Tolush as a trainer in 1950, testified that he soon noticed a dramatic improvement in Spassky’s play as he fought for the initiative in the style of Tolush. Spassky continued to improve in subsequent years, coming second to Mark Taimanov in the 1952 Leningrad Championship and receiving praise from Botvinnik. Before he had even played in a USSR Championship semi-final he was selected to play in the strong 1953 Bucharest international, where he played Vasily Smyslov in the first round.
This was Smyslov’s only loss in a tournament. “Smyslov didn’t talk to me for the rest of the tournament,” said Spassky. At a later date Spassky told how instructions had been received from Moscow, after the Hungarian player Laszlo Szabo had taken the lead, for the Soviet players to draw their remaining games with each other, so Spassky drew with Tolush, Petrosian and Isaac Boleslavsky. He now qualified as an international master.
1955 was a good year for Spassky – celebrating his 18th birthday during his first appearance in the USSR Championship Final, becoming world junior champion and qualifying for the Gothenburg Interzonal. This game was played in round 6 of that USSR final, where he finished equal third behind Smyslov and Efim Geller.
Spassky narrowly qualified from the Interzonal for the 1956 Candidates Tournament, becoming the youngest to earn the grandmaster title at 18. He was now appearing in the Soviet press, recognised for chess while also studying journalism at Leningrad University and achieving sporting success in the high jump with a leap of 1.80 metres.
Everything seemed to going well for Boris at this time, but there was a serious threat to his future progress. The interpreter for the Sports Committee reported Spassky for his inappropriate remarks and questions during his foreign travels. Fortunately an official in the committee, Dmitri Postnikov, decided to give him a terrible scolding but did not take the matter further. “Postnikov was my guardian angel”, said Spassky.
In 1956 Spassky shared first place in the USSR Championship, finishing a point ahead of another rising star, Mikhail Tal, but losing the subsequent first place play-off to Taimanov. On the journey to the Amsterdam Candidates, the Soviet delegation stopped over in Paris to attend the opening of a monument to the first Russian world champion Alexander Alekhine, at Montparnasse cemetery. Alekhine was always one of Spassky’s favourite players.
In Amsterdam Smyslov won the event, losing only to Spassky, who finished joint third with four other players, including Bronstein, Geller, Petrosian and Szabo. The main “prize” for him was the granting of a two-room apartment for him, his mother and two siblings, double the size of his previous one. Tal won the 1957 USSR championship, with Spassky fourth equal. Here is a celebrated game from that tournament.
Later that year Spassky led the Soviet team to victory in the World Students’ Olympiad, where they won every match, and finished first in his USSR Championship semi-final. Spassky now looked forward hopefully to the final in Riga, which would also be a zonal for the world championship, with four places at stake. At the age of 20, the chess world was at his feet.
Part 2: Reaching the summit
The 1958 USSR Championship was a qualifier for the Interzonal Tournament, with three future world champions and eight candidates fighting for four places. Spassky started well, celebrating his 21st birthday with a win against David Bronstein before having a run of five games with no wins. In the last round, playing White against Mikhail Tal, he needed a win to avoid having to join a play-off; Tal only needed a draw. Spassky refused an early draw offer, and the game was adjourned and resumed the next day. Overpressing he drove Tal’s king into his own camp, only to find that he had created a mating net for himself.
Tal became USSR champion and began his ascent to the global throne, winning the Interzonal and the Candidates, before in 1960 defeating the reigning champion, Mikhail Botvinnik. Spassky, by contrast, would now miss out on the battle for the world crown for the next six years.
Garry Kasparov suggests that Spassky’s nervous system was not yet ready for these challenges. However, Spassky did have some good results subsequently, including second in the 1959 USSR Championship, equal with Tal but behind Tigran Petrosian. That year he also got married, and in 1960 he and his wife had a daughter. But 1960 proved to be a difficult year: he suffered health problems, some poor results and even a breakdown in his marriage. He said that he and his wife had become “like opposite-coloured bishops” and in 1961 they divorced. He also parted company, though amicably, with his coach Alexander Tolush.
Early in 1961 Igor Bondarevsky became his new coach just as Spassky was playing in another Zonal USSR Championship. Despite a good start, a run of losses meant that yet again he failed to qualify when he lost his final-round game against Leonid Stein.
Bondarevsky was a very experienced professional coach and quickly established a good rapport with Spassky, succeeding in making him work much harder in training. This game in the subsequent USSR Championship (the 29th edition, also held in 1961, from 16 November to 20 December) shows the practical application of his improved understanding, provoking Tal into a gambling attack.
Spassky had finally won the USSR Championship, defeating the second-placed Lev Polugaevsky as well as Tal along the way. He admitted afterwards that he gained a lot of confidence from this victory and demonstrated this with good results in 1962.
Spassky first played against Viktor Korchnoi in the 1948 USSR Junior Championship, losing quickly after an early blunder. It was said that the young Boris left the tournament hall distraught. They both came from Leningrad and met each other many times in subsequent years, playing their last game together more than 60 years later. Spassky didn’t need to rely on attacks for his victories. In the game against Korchnoi below, played at the Moscow Zonal in 1964, the universality of his style is illustrated by the simple knight retreat on move 12 that leaves Black unable to maintain his centre.
At his best Spassky was described as having a universal style, comfortable in all positions, perhaps because he played a wide variety of openings. As White he mostly played e4 (sometimes with the King’s Gambit), but with a third of his games beginning d4. He was known for playing the Leningrad Variation (Bg5) against the Nimzo-Indian. As Black he mostly responded to e4 with e5 and had a good record in the Ruy Lopez, but he also played the Sicilian throughout his career. Against d4 he defended the Queen’s Gambit Declined and the Nimzo. One of his most notable and successful lines as White was the Closed Sicilian, used so effectively against Efim Geller in their 1965 and 1968 Candidates Matches. Having seen these games, I also started playing the Closed line. This was game 6 of the 1968 match.
In order to qualify for his 1966 World Championship match with reigning champion Tigran Petrosian, Spassky had to play 98 qualifying games, starting with the USSR championship semi-final and ending with his match wins against Paul Keres, Geller and Tal. Coach Bondarevsky had proved successful in overcoming Spassky’s famed reluctance to overstrain himself, with results showing the benefit of his hard work.
The 24-game Petrosian-Spassky match was held in Moscow between 9 April and 9 June 1966. Spassky was the favourite to win, but suffered a narrow 12.5-11.5 defeat. Afterwards he described his opponent as “first and foremost a stupendous tactician”. The first six games of the match were drawn, but Petrosian took the lead with a win in game 7. Games 8 and 9 were drawn, but in game 10 Petrosian produced the famous finish shown below to take a two-game lead. Both players’ seconds, Igor Bondaevsky and Isaac Boleslavsky, agreed that this was the best game of the match.
Spassky then fought back, equalising when he won the 19th game. However, winning games 20 and 22 gave Petrosian the 12 points he needed to retain his title (the champion kept the crown in the event of a drawn match). Spassky had the consolation of winning game 23 (shown below), although it would be fair to say that Petrosian may have been below par having just retained his title.
In the last game of the match, Spassky tried vainly to equalise the score – though, even in the event of a drawn match Petrosian would still have retained his title – before eventually agreeing a draw on move 77.
Despite the disappointment of coming up short against Petrosian, Spassky continued to play at a high level, winning Santa Monica without losing a game later in the year, beating Bobby Fischer during the tournament. In 1967 he played 70 games, losing only with Black to Hungarian GM Lajos Portisch and his old rival Efim Geller, and in the following year’s Candidates matches he defeated Geller, Bent Larsen and Korchnoi, each by three clear games. After losing to Spassky, Korchnoi stated: “I do not doubt for a minute that we are going to have a new world champion.”
Now he would face Petrosian again, and this time he was ready. He intended to keep the Tiger under constant pressure. The 1966 world title match between Petrosian and Spassky had produced just seven decisive games. The 1969 encounter, played in Moscow between 14 April and 17 June , and once again giving the holder Petrosian the advantage of retaining his title if the 24-game match was drawn, saw 10 decisive games.
Petrosian won with Black in the opening game, outmanoeuvring Spassky in an endgame, but Spassky returned the compliment with Black in game 4. Spassky went 3-1 up in the match, but Petrosian hit back to level at 3-3. Spassky then struck a crucial blow by winning game 17 with White against Petrosian’s Sicilian Defence – a surprisingly double-edged opening to choose given that the champion was tied at 3-3 and only needed to draw the match to retain his crown. Spassky then stretched his lead to +2 in game 19 (see below), emphatically refuting another Sicilian.
Spassky and Petrosian exchanged wins in games 20 and 21 to give Spassky an 11.5-9.5 lead, while Game 22 ended in a draw. Spassky was now ahead by 12-10, meaning that Petrosian had to win the final two games to retain his title. Petrosian essayed another Sicilian in game 23, but once again Spassky got the better of the play and, when the time control was reached, had to seal a move in the position shown below.
Spassky sealed 41. c6 and offered a draw in a winning position. Petrosian, on the day of his 40th birthday, accepted the offer. Spassky, after decades of struggle, had tamed the Tiger and become 10th world champion at the age of 32. The Soviet Union had a new champion, cementing their 20-year stranglehold on the title, but little did they know that a whirlwind was about to blow away their assumptions of global domination.
Part 3: The match of the century – and beyond
Spassky was an active world champion in the years immediately after his victory. He won in San Juan in 1969 and in the Leiden and IBM tournaments in 1970. He also played the most famous game – the win against Ben Larsen shown below – of the first USSR-Rest of the World Match in Belgrade, where the elo system was used for the first time to determine seeding. Surprisingly Fischer agreed to concede board 1 to Larsen, perhaps because he had not played in tournaments since September 1968.
In round 3 Spassky blundered in mutual time trouble, turning an equal position into a win for Larsen. In round 4 he ceded his place, ostensibly due to a cold, to reserve Leonid Stein, who also lost. Although the USSR narrowly won the overall match by 20.5-19.5, it proved a major shock to the supposedly superior (Tal on board 9!) Soviets, especially as they lost on the prestigious top boards, with Larsen, Fischer, Portisch and Vlastimil Hort all beating their opponents.
In contrast, the 19th Olympiad in Siegen, West Germany, was a personal triumph for Spassky, who won the gold medal on board 1 as part of the USSR team’s 10th consecutive victory. Kasparov considered this to be the crowning point of Spassky’s period as champion.
The sixth-round USA-USSR match, with Spassky up against Fischer on board 1, was much anticipated, and tickets sold out early. The organisers relayed the moves to a separate hall and placed four extra demonstration boards in the foyer. Korchnoi said that the Americans were so confident of victory that they arranged a post-match banquet. Edmar Mednis noted that Spassky was obviously nervous, smoking one cigarette after another. (Incidentally Petrosian extended his unbeaten record at olympiads to 90 games. His only olympiad loss (out of 148 games) was to Robert Hübner in the 1972 event.)
Kasparov thought that Spassky rested on his laurels after this, didn’t play enough tournaments, didn’t exert himself enough in training, and crucially parted company with trainer Igor Bondarevsky before his match with Fischer.
Spassky had mixed results in 1971. He was joint first (with Hans Ree) in a relatively weak Canadian Open, third in Göteborg (undefeated but behind Ulf Andersson and Hort) and, perhaps worryingly, seventh in the second Alekhine Memorial held in Moscow in November/December. Spassky had been obliged to play in this tournament by the Soviet Sports Committee, who were worried that he was not preparing hard enough for his title match. This was an incredibly strong tournament, won by the 20-year-old Anatoly Karpov ahead of Stein, Smyslov, Vladimir Tukmakov, Petrosian and Tal. In the same year, Fischer defeated Taimanov 6-0, Larsen 6-0 and Petrosian 6.5-2.5 in Candidates matches.
For the first time in a quarter of a century the world championship match would not be held in Moscow, Reykjavik being the eventual choice. Fide president Max Euwe had a difficult job dealing with Fischer’s many demands, but finally the match was set to open on 1 July. Fischer failed to turn up and only appeared on 4 July after the prize fund was doubled by a donation from a British millionaire, Jim Slater. Spassky said later that he could have claimed the match, but felt he could not consider himself a true champion by winning that way.
The match began on 11 July. Fischer blundered in the first game and was defaulted for not appearing for the second. The third was played in a separate room without an audience at Fischer’s demand. Spassky lost and then failed to capitalise on superior opening preparation in game 4. Spassky seemed broken after this and lost four of the next six games.
Game 6 may have been crucial to the eventual result. Spassky not only considered it the best game of the match, but he also joined in the applause for Fischer at the end.
Wins in games 8 and 10 meant that Fischer had now won five of the previous eight, and led 6.5-3.5 going into game 11. Svetozar Gligoric reported that “it seemed … like the end of the great Soviet chess empire”, while “Spassky seemed resigned to his fate.” The match appeared to be over, but the hall was still packed with spectators. Spassky opened with e4 and followed game 7’s Poisoned Pawn Sicilian for the first nine moves.
Spassky was not on stage when Fischer stopped the clock and waited in vain to shake hands, before leaving the stage. When Spassky appeared from behind the curtains, he was met by roaring applause. He seemed to be back in with a chance of successfully defending his title, but the hope proved illusory and this was Spassky’s last win in the match. A win for Fischer in game 13 was followed by seven consecutive draws, with Spassky fighting hard but unable to get the full point, partly due to his difficulty in meeting surprising new openings from Fischer – the Alekhine’s and Pirc Defences. A win in game 21 made Fischer the new world champion, winning 12.5-8.5.
Fischer’s success seems all the more remarkable when the details of Soviet preparation for the match were published 20 years later. After Petrosian’s loss in the Candidate’s, the Sports Committee set up in secret a group comprising ex-champions Botvinnik, Smyslov, Petrosian and Tal, together with Yuri Averbakh, Korchnoi, Keres and Alexander Kotov. The aim was to evaluate and report on Fischer’s style of play in support of Spassky’s preparation (which included a five-month training session). Korchnoi was the only one to suggest that Fischer would expand his opening repertoire. However, it may be that the breakdown in relations between Spassky and Bondarevsky was the crucial factor in Spassky’s eventual loss, a view supported by Kasparov.
After their debriefing following Fischer’s triumph, the only action taken by the Sports Committee was a reduction of Spassky’s stipend to that of a grandmaster. It may have been worse but for the influence of other Soviet sporting successes. On the day of his defeat, Valery Borzov won the 100 metres at the Munich Olympics, then the USSR beat Canada at ice hockey, and on the day Spassky arrived home the USSR won the Olympic gold in basketball, controversially beating the USA (their first loss since 1936).
Spassky returned to normal tournament chess in 1973, Tal commenting that he began as a shadow of his former self before “his complete rehabilitation at the USSR Championship“, one of the strongest ever held, winning by a full two points ahead of Karpov. As an indication of the tournament strength, Keres, Tal and Smyslov finished on minus scores. Spassky won four games as White against Sicilians, including this one against Nukhim Rashkovsky.
In 1974 Spassky defeated Robert Byrne in the Candidates before losing in the semi-final 1-4 to Karpov. Now that Karpov was the new Soviet hope for the world title, Spassky was treated less tolerantly, especially when he refused to sign a collective letter against Korchnoi. Tournament invitations were declined by the Sports Committee and, in addition to his other conflicts, he left his wife, Larissa. He started a relationship with a French Embassy employee, Marina Shcherbacheva, and eventually was allowed to marry under the 1975 Helsinki Accords. He failed to qualify from the 1976 Manila Interzonal, and he and Marina left in September to live in France.
Spassky may have thought that his part in the world championship was over, but he received the news that he was being given Fischer’s place in the Candidates’ quarter-final. Learning from past experience, he began preparation five weeks in advance, playing training matches with Hübner and Czech-born GM Lubosh Kavalek.
Spassky fell ill during his quarter-final against Hort, played in Iceland. He was hospitalised and had an appendix removed, forcing him to request a postponement. Hort could have claimed the match, but sportingly he refused to win in this manner, played further games on resumption and lost. Spassky then defeated Portisch, qualifying to meet his old rival, Viktor Korchnoi, in the final.
This match, played in Belgrade, destroyed the previous amicable relations between the players. While the actual defector, Korchnoi, had to play without a flag, Spassky – now living in France – played under his Soviet citizenship. Spassky benefited from a strong Soviet team who were keen to ensure that Karpov did not have to face the rapidly improving Korchnoi, who called Spassky “a one-legged dissident”. After game 10 Korchnoi held a 5-0 lead in the 20 game match, before Spassky incredibly won the next four in succession. However, Korchnoi recovered his poise and went on to win 10.5-7.5. After this match, Spassky and Korchnoi did not speak for six years.
In the following title cycle, Spassky narrowly lost to Portisch and in 1982 failed to qualify from the Interzonal. His last truly strong tournament result was his win in Linares 1983 ahead of Karpov. His last game under the Soviet flag was in Bugojno in May 1984, where he discovered that he would not be selected for the next USSR vs the World Match.
In November he played for France in the 1984 Thessaloniki Olympiad, the only ex-champion present, as Karpov and Kasparov were in the middle of their marathon, ultimately abandoned match. I include the game below from the Olympiad, played for France against Australia, because I was there, attending as an accredited reporter for the Glasgow Herald and travelling with the Scottish teams. In the airport the Scottish delegation encountered Boris at the airport awaiting the hotel shuttle bus. One excitedly whispered “Isn’t that Boris Spassky?” He was on his own now – no KGB minders – and we were all a bit starstruck, even more so when he got on our bus.
Eventually one of the Scottish team could resist it no longer and boldly joined Boris on the adjacent seat. They chatted amiably until the bus reached our hotel, and it was confirmed that Boris was perfectly charming, happy to chat about chess matters with a fellow player. Leonard Barden, in his foreword to Bernard Cafferty’s book on Spassky, had written: “Your first impression of Spassky is of charm, relaxed good looks and an easy acceptance of strangers.” We witnessed this at first hand.
Spassky played all 14 games at the Olympiad, drawing 12 and winning two, helping France to seventh place. All but one of his draws was under 30 moves, leading to speculation that he now preferred playing tennis.
Spassky was now in his late 40s. He played in the 1985 Candidates and came a respectable joint sixth with 8/15, but that was just short of a play-off place and he never appeared in the Candidates again. He was in the world top 10 for the last time in 1987 – at the age of 50. He was near the bottom of the field at Linares in 1990, and thereafter played mainly lower-level tournaments, veterans’ events and exhibition matches.
The most famous (or perhaps notorious) of those was the “rematch” with Bobby Fischer in the autumn of 1992 – a match played in war-torn Yugolavia and sponsored by a Serbian millionaire. Fischer won 10-5 – he had always insisted that a world title match should be first to 10 wins, the ostensible reason he refused to defend his crown against Karpov in 1995 – and there were 15 (discounted) draws.
Both players were rusty, but Fischer’s victory was impressive given that he had barely played for 20 years (though he had taken the precaution of arranging a 10-game warm-up match with Gligoric to get used to playing with the incremental time controls he insisted on (in 1988, always ahead of his time, he had patented a clock with increments).
After the match, FIscher proclaimed himself to be still world champion, but no one was really listening any more. Playing in ex-Yugoslavia meant that he was deemed a sanctions-buster by the US government and his life as an exile was confirmed, ending with his death in his adopted home of Iceland in 2008 at the age of 64. The coincidence of his age at death and the number of squares on a chess board, where in truth he had lived his life, was commented on at the time. For Spassky the match had been a chance for one last big payday – the match was played for a purse of $5m, of which the winner took two-thirds. Spassky, thanks to 1972, is destined always to be twinned with Fischer, in some respects obscuring his own tremendous achievements, but in 1992 at least being dragged along in the wake of Fischer’s global fame proved a nice little earner.
The game below was played in 2009 as part of an eight-game rapid match between Spassky and Viktor Korchnoi that was seen as a reconciliation between the two old Leningraders, who had reached a combined age of 150 that year. Spassky said of Korchnoi’s incessant playing activity: “We were all blown out long ago, but he continues to fight.”
On 26 December 2009, in the concluding game of this match, Boris Spassky played his last competition game – a draw that made it 4-4 in the match. In the end, the two old rivals – the man who had made it to world champion and the player who had never quite made it to the top of the tree and is seen as one of the great “nearly men” in the history of chess – could, perhaps appropriately, not be separated.
After the match, Spassky said that he had lost all ambition, without which it is impossible to play chess. Korchnoi, though the elder by six years and despite suffering a stroke in 2012, ploughed on relentlessly until his death in 2016. Korchnoi lived for chess – he was still in the world top 100 at the age of 75 – but then perhaps he felt he still had something to prove. Spassky had been world champion and had nothing left to prove. He will always be seen a foil for Fischer in the great psychodrama that consumed chess in the 1970s, but to portray Spassky only in that way would be grossly unfair. He was a great champion in his own right, and one who overcame many obstacles to reach the pinnacle of winning the world title.
Afterword
I began by explaining why at the age of 15 I wanted to play like Spassky – he played the King’s Gambit and later I tried to copy his Closed Sicilian. Only later did I develop an admiration for his sportsmanship, especially as he could have won his 1972 title match by default. Thankfully his decision did not deprive us of the match that led to a chess explosion in many parts of the world, including the UK.
Understanding his difficult relationship with a system that supported his talent but suppressed his individuality, I related his life to another famous Leningrader whom I also admire. I discovered the music of Dmitri Shostakovich (actually born in St Petersburg) in the same year as the Spassky-Fischer world title match and it has since held a special place in my musical life. Shostakovich also achieved fame as a teenager with his First Symphony and fortunately, unlike many others, survived the Stalin era to produce many more great works.
Sources
The Soviet School of Chess, Kotov and Yudovich (1958)
Soviet Chess, compiled by R G Wade (1968)
Boris Spassky, Master of Tactics, Bernard Cafferty (1972)
Fischer v Spassky, Svetozar Gligoric (1972)
Russians versus Fischer, Plietsky and Voronkov (1994)
My Great Predecessors, Part III, IV & V Garry Kasparov (2004), (2004) and (2006)
Finding Bobby Fischer, Dirk Ten Guezendam (2015)
Spassky’s Best Games, Bezgodov and Oleinikov (2023)
Alan Scrimgour is chair of Kingston Chess Club and plays for the Scottish senior team
