Sri Lanka It's Happening

January 20, 2008

The best chess player that ever lived is dead. Bobby Fischer died on the 17th, but there was so much happening in my life and here in Sri Lanka that I didn't find out about the sad event until today.

Fischer was the reason behinds hundreds of thousands if not millions of people taking up the game. He is the man who made it a popular sport in the west. It is sad but fitting that he should die in Reykjavík the city he helped to put on the map. His age 64 another that is in the heart of every chess player.

Fischer had retired a couple of years before I was even born, but he was still my favourite player during all those years that I played for the school and university teams. Certainly he continued to inspire players well after his retirement.

Some people dispute that that he is the best chess player ever citing the fact that countless others including Kasparov and Topalov have much higher ratings than Fischer's peak. They are woefully unaware of rating inflation. Rating inflation has even made the Grand Master title obsolete. Some people argue that Fischer was mad. Well there is a saying that all chess players are slightly mad.

Posted by raditha at January 20, 2008 3:29 PM