From Frank Brady, who wrote one of the bestselling books on Bobby Fischer of all time and who was himself a friend of Fischer’s, comes an impressively researched biography that for the first time completely captures the remarkable arc of Bobby Fischer’s life. When Bobby Fischer passed away in January 2008, he left behind a confounding legacy. Everyone knew the basics of his life—he began as a brilliant youngster, then became the pride of American chess, then took a sharp turn, struggling with paranoia and mental illness. But nobody truly understood him.
What motivated Fischer from such a young age, and what was the source of his remarkable intellect? How could a man so ambivalent about money and fame be so driven to succeed? What drew this man of Jewish descent to fulminate against Jews, and how was it that a mind so famously disciplined could unravel so completely? From Fischer’s meteoric rise, to an utterly dominant prime unequaled by any American chess player, to his eventual descent into madness, the book draws upon hundreds of newly discovered documents and recordings and numerous firsthand interviews conducted with those who knew Fischer best. It paints, for the very first time, a complete picture of one of America’s most enigmatic icons. This is the definitive account of a fascinating man and an extraordinary life, one that at last reconciles Fischer’s deeply contradictory legacy and answers the question, who was Bobby Fischer?
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"Apparently,having an IQ over 180 doesn't bring you happiness. Instead, what Frank Brady describes is a life that has elements of a Greek tragedy--without the nobility. In this biography, Bobby Fischer burst on the chess scene becoming a master at 13 and a grand master at age 15. He rose like a rocket to become the American champion several years in a row, and then became world champion in 1972 in Reykjavik, Iceland after beating Russian Grand Master Boris Spassky. But then the darker side of Bobby Fischer seemed to take hold. He returned to a hero's welcome in the United States and over the next 20 years turned down millions of dollars for chess tournaments because the organizers either couldn't or wouldn't agree to all of his, often petty, demands. He was reduced to living for years in poverty in Los Angeles--subsisting primarily on his mother's Social Security checks--and his political views became more extreme. He was increasingly paranoid, rabidly anti-Semitic (although he was Jewish), and a Holocaust denier. He saw conspiracy everywhere and believed that he was the target of multiple death threats. Because of the civil war in the former Yugoslavia, the United States placed travel restrictions on U.S. citizens wanting to travel to that area. Then Bobby Fischer announced in 1992 that he would play a rematch with Boris Spassky in Montenegro. Although warned by the State Department not to travel to the area, Fischer decided to play the match with Spassky. He also announced that he had not paid taxes in the U.S. for the past 20 years. Following his second victory over Spassky, Fischer became a celebrity fugitive trying to avoid arrest and deportation to the United States for tax evasion. He also did not want to pay any taxes on the $5 million that he won in the second Spassky match, which he had deposited in a bank in Switzerland. By the time of his death, Fischer had publicly celebrated the 9/11 attack on the United States, tried to renounce his U.S. citizenship, been arrested and held in a Japanese prison for months, became a citizen of Iceland, and spent the last few years of his life living in Iceland as a virtual recluse. Brady delivers a fascinating book about a deeply disturbed and unhappy man--who, coincidentally, was a chess genius. Luckily, the reader has to have no prior knowledge of chess history, the rules of chess, or the strategies that are involved in international level play in order to enjoy this book."
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Judy (4 out of 5 stars)