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The Reliable Past

207 Seiten, kartoniert, New in Chess, 1. Auflage 2003

21,95 €
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The Reliable Past is the eagerly awaited sequel to Russian Silhouettes, Genna Sosonko's marvellous collection of portraits from the golden age of Soviet chess. Sosonko, who left Leningrad to settle in Holland in 1972, described champions and other key figures of Soviet chess from a privileged dual perspective. In this new book, the author again shows himself a perceptive chronicler of a time when chess occupied a unique position in his native country; but he also wanders across its borders with his memories of Dutch World Champion Max Euwe and touching tribute to the first ever British grandmaster, Tony Miles.


Ode to a Free Man
It is no secret that many well-known chess players, after leaving for the West in Soviet times, were able to achieve far more there than they had in their mother country (the most striking example being Kortchnoi). But they normally left when they were already grandmasters, whereas Genna Sosonko, who was virtually the first to leave the USSR, in 1972, was 'only' a simple Leningrad master. After settling in Holland, he promptly engaged in what he liked best: he began working for the magazine Schaakbulletin (the predecessor of New In Chess Magazine) and he threw himself wholeheartedly into tournament life
The sharp progress that he made in chess at the age of thirty makes a big impression. Sosonko developed into a grandmaster of world class, a strong competitor and well-known theoretician, a creative player who sought new paths and had his own ideas.
In these years he also revealed his talent in the field of chess journalism, especially of a literary variety. This genre had attracted him long before. Genna, a man of broad humanitarian erudition and a sharp, critical mind, is greatly interested in the world of chess, its people and its past (which is a rarity in modern times). When we met in the late 1980s we often talked about these topics, and discussed the burning problems of chess life. In the 1990s many of the thoughts that featured in our conversations were expressed in his splendid scholarly articles. They in turn were transformed into the book Russian Silhouettes (2001), which I read and re-read with enormous pleasure. And now you have before you a new collection of incomparable literary chess essays by Genna Sosonko - The Reliable Past.
The reader is presented with a gallery of wonderful pen-portraits, written with a love and devotion for chess, and with a due measure of objectivity and detachment. Look - this is the chess world, its heroes with all their virtues and defects! The most varied people find their way into this distinctive pantheon - those who have set up the basis and the point of chess' existence. The author keenly senses the underlying psychology and the hidden sources of events. And in every line, one is aware of his desire to make our chess world slightly better, cleaner and brighter.
I have to admit that his selfless creativity helped me in my work on the book My Great Predecessors. I wanted to show the process of chess development precisely through the fate of its past heroes, and to impart to the reader not only the moves and variations, but also the very atmosphere of those times.
But how was it that Genna achieved such a level of inner freedom? Here is his own admission: 'My present became what it is largely thanks to the past, which I wanted to reject. [...] In order to perceive Russia, I had to move away from it and see it from a distance.' Yes, he was fortunate to leave at an age when Soviet complexes had not yet managed to take hold of him entirely. After all, even today the chess elite is primarily Soviet in its mentality; even many of those who departed in the 1980s and '90s have left their heart in Soviet chess. And this is to say nothing of journalists. Reading many present-day articles, one constantly senses intrigues and 'trimming of the sails' to suit the readership. With Genna there is no trace of it! He has managed to become a genuinely free person and to rise above the conventionalities of the chess world. It is very important that he has an excellent knowledge of this world and is himself an indelible part of it, but it is his position of an independent observer, keenly noticing both the good and the bad, that makes his stories so rich and fascinating. His portraits are not journalism, but literature. Whether you like it or not, that's how it was! And he is not very concerned what will be said about this by any prominent chess figures.
Genna Sosonko can safely be considered a worthy successor to the best traditions of chess literature of the first half of the twentieth century, which was developed, in particular, in the pre-war Russian emigration (Znosko-Borovsky, Tartakower) and almost completely eliminated in the Soviet Union, since from the start of Soviet domination in chess the game was politicised and the slightest opportunity was lost to tell the whole truth about people, or to give a rounded and objective description of them. It is to Genna's credit that he has been able to revive this genre and to create a style of narrative that gives genuine pleasure to even the most demanding reader.
I hope that the author of this book will continue for as long as possible doing that which he does better than anyone in the world. Since every new story of his preserves a few more grains of our chess existence. To me this seems very important, and I hope that Genna will be able to preserve for future generations many more characters and destinies. However chess has changed, their history will always be interesting to people as a part of human culture.

G. Kasparov, Moscow, July 2003


In the preface of a book the reader and the writer are looking in opposite directions. For a reader the book is situated in the future. For the writer it's in the past. And the past is what this book is about. It's about the history of chess and about people from the chess world.
Having travelled the path of centuries, chess has completely changed its initial image of a nice way to pass the time for some bored Rajah. The motto of the Royal Theatre in Copenhagen - 'Not just for entertainment' - can be applied to modern chess. While for millions of chess fans it remains just a game, on the higher levels it became a sport and a science, and what is left artful is actually just one thing: the artful way to use the achievements of modern technology.
In many areas of life - music, literature, politics - when a person becomes famous he can rest on his laurels: his reputation will work for him. Chess is another story: you are only judged by your present achievements, not the old ones. There are no phony heroes in chess; it's impossible to discover a star today who lived at the same time with Capablanca but had passed unnoticed by his contemporaries, and it is impossible to discredit an outstanding player - because a player's reputation is only proved by the quality of his games and by his results. Chess requires continuous effort, a player must keep proving his class and reputation. That's why top-level chess has always been a difficult if not excruciating job.
Already in the 1930s Huizinga wrote that although chess is an increasingly serious and therefore cruel game, it still remains a game. Nowadays, it has become a sport more than ever. The more static a sport is, the more developed are the ways to analyse all the different situations and positions, and chess is the most characteristic example of such a sport. The informational explosion that we are all very familiar with, has very much affected chess too in the last decade.
Hundreds of games that are played in numerous tournaments be come public knowledge within a couple of hours from the actual playing time, and often they are broadcast live. Chess gets thoroughly researched and examined with the help of computers. The romantic fresco paintings covering chess have been removed, and numerous holes were exposed as a result. A magic spell has been removed from chess and it remains a big question for me whether ii will ever be possible to restore it.
When I replay the games of the great old masters and compare them with the modern games, I get the impression that the ruins of beauty are even more striking than beauty itself. However impressive modern glass-and-concrete buildings may be, the Pompei ruins are no less impressive. It is impossible to say which music is 'better' - old or modern - and in the same way we can't say what chess gives us more pleasure - Greco, Morphy, Steinitz, Capablanca, Tal or Kasparov. But fortunately chess is very versatile, and different people like different things about it.
It is very difficult to fairly judge the events of twenty, thirty, forty years ago from the position of present times. The realities of life are very flexible and transient. It is especially true when we talk about Soviet times, its rules, its laws - official or unwritten.
When I think about Soviet chess and about some of its concepts that become more and more vague and sometimes even incomprehensible for the new generations with every passing year, I ask myself if it is really necessary to preserve memories of this relatively narrow area of our culture? I think the answer to this question can only be a positive one. There is no doubt that every human experience is worth analysing and systematising, including that rather special experience on which modern chess is based. This allows us to make conclusions not only about the game itself but also about the system that facilitated its development.
When Herz studied the electromagnetic light theory he said that mathematical formulas have their own life. The same is true about chess, about its beauty and logic. Chess is more intelligent than we are - or even more intelligent than its creator. Modern chess can't
exist without using the French curves of the past. I tried to tell you about people that created these French curves. I wanted to write their names in the sand before the waves will erase them for ever and they will dissolve in the ocean of computer chess of the 21st century. Many of the people I write about, I met in person when I still physically lived in Leningrad, but in my mind already emigrated to the West. So the words that you'll read were written in the second half of my life, because at the time when the events took place I only had some vague feelings that I was not able to adequately express in words.
When, more than thirty years ago, I left the Soviet Union I wanted to leave all the past behind as soon as possible, but only after I put my seal on the past did I realise the difference between what I tried to run away from and what I regretted having left behind. For those who stayed in the USSR, I became a strange phenomenon: in contradiction with Saadi's sad saying: Some are deceased, others wander far away. I was for many both a distant friend and a deceased one.
My life in Leningrad was unfolding like an endless tape, but now I feel that time passes much faster for me. This is probably what everybody feels when approaching the end of the 'journey'... It is just like an hourglass that has been in use for a long time and its waist got wider, so the sand falls faster than when it was new. At the end of our lives we don't feel so much that we are getting older but that the world around us is getting younger. And most of all this applies to the chess world. It's a paradox that chess is becoming more and more complicated - but chess players' personalities are getting more and more primitive. Probably the reason is that top-level chess requires more time and effort and does not leave much space for other activities and hobbies.
In this book I also talk about people I met only after moving to the West. I tried to describe these people not only from the perspective of chess but also through their relations with other people and the society which is very different from what I experienced in the first half of my life. I tried to show what worries them, what they are like in communication with other people, what kind of mistakes they make, what tricks they use to reach their goals - which is not less interesting than their games. While talking about other people I was rediscovering my own self and overcoming the natural embarrassment that we all experience when we have to talk about ourselves.
In the hierarchy of modern values, chess takes a modest, a very modest place compared to literature, music, and even to practically all other sports. Moreover, the future prospects of chess are not at all clear. But trying to predict the future is senseless: we may get such surprises which neither pessimists nor optimists could think about in their wildest dreams. That is why I wrote about the past of chess, but in this past you will make many new and unexpected discoveries.

G. Sosonko, Amsterdam, July 2003
The Reliable Past is the eagerly awaited sequel to Russian Silhouettes, Genna Sosonko's marvellous collection of portraits from the golden age of Soviet chess. Sosonko, who left Leningrad to settle in Holland in 1972, described champions and other key figures of Soviet chess from a privileged dual perspective. In this new book, the author again shows himself a perceptive chronicler of a time when chess occupied a unique position in his native country; but he also wanders across its borders with his memories of Dutch World Champion Max Euwe and touching tribute to the first ever British grandmaster, Tony Miles.


Ode to a Free Man
It is no secret that many well-known chess players, after leaving for the West in Soviet times, were able to achieve far more there than they had in their mother country (the most striking example being Kortchnoi). But they normally left when they were already grandmasters, whereas Genna Sosonko, who was virtually the first to leave the USSR, in 1972, was 'only' a simple Leningrad master. After settling in Holland, he promptly engaged in what he liked best: he began working for the magazine Schaakbulletin (the predecessor of New In Chess Magazine) and he threw himself wholeheartedly into tournament life
The sharp progress that he made in chess at the age of thirty makes a big impression. Sosonko developed into a grandmaster of world class, a strong competitor and well-known theoretician, a creative player who sought new paths and had his own ideas.
In these years he also revealed his talent in the field of chess journalism, especially of a literary variety. This genre had attracted him long before. Genna, a man of broad humanitarian erudition and a sharp, critical mind, is greatly interested in the world of chess, its people and its past (which is a rarity in modern times). When we met in the late 1980s we often talked about these topics, and discussed the burning problems of chess life. In the 1990s many of the thoughts that featured in our conversations were expressed in his splendid scholarly articles. They in turn were transformed into the book Russian Silhouettes (2001), which I read and re-read with enormous pleasure. And now you have before you a new collection of incomparable literary chess essays by Genna Sosonko - The Reliable Past.
The reader is presented with a gallery of wonderful pen-portraits, written with a love and devotion for chess, and with a due measure of objectivity and detachment. Look - this is the chess world, its heroes with all their virtues and defects! The most varied people find their way into this distinctive pantheon - those who have set up the basis and the point of chess' existence. The author keenly senses the underlying psychology and the hidden sources of events. And in every line, one is aware of his desire to make our chess world slightly better, cleaner and brighter.
I have to admit that his selfless creativity helped me in my work on the book My Great Predecessors. I wanted to show the process of chess development precisely through the fate of its past heroes, and to impart to the reader not only the moves and variations, but also the very atmosphere of those times.
But how was it that Genna achieved such a level of inner freedom? Here is his own admission: 'My present became what it is largely thanks to the past, which I wanted to reject. [...] In order to perceive Russia, I had to move away from it and see it from a distance.' Yes, he was fortunate to leave at an age when Soviet complexes had not yet managed to take hold of him entirely. After all, even today the chess elite is primarily Soviet in its mentality; even many of those who departed in the 1980s and '90s have left their heart in Soviet chess. And this is to say nothing of journalists. Reading many present-day articles, one constantly senses intrigues and 'trimming of the sails' to suit the readership. With Genna there is no trace of it! He has managed to become a genuinely free person and to rise above the conventionalities of the chess world. It is very important that he has an excellent knowledge of this world and is himself an indelible part of it, but it is his position of an independent observer, keenly noticing both the good and the bad, that makes his stories so rich and fascinating. His portraits are not journalism, but literature. Whether you like it or not, that's how it was! And he is not very concerned what will be said about this by any prominent chess figures.
Genna Sosonko can safely be considered a worthy successor to the best traditions of chess literature of the first half of the twentieth century, which was developed, in particular, in the pre-war Russian emigration (Znosko-Borovsky, Tartakower) and almost completely eliminated in the Soviet Union, since from the start of Soviet domination in chess the game was politicised and the slightest opportunity was lost to tell the whole truth about people, or to give a rounded and objective description of them. It is to Genna's credit that he has been able to revive this genre and to create a style of narrative that gives genuine pleasure to even the most demanding reader.
I hope that the author of this book will continue for as long as possible doing that which he does better than anyone in the world. Since every new story of his preserves a few more grains of our chess existence. To me this seems very important, and I hope that Genna will be able to preserve for future generations many more characters and destinies. However chess has changed, their history will always be interesting to people as a part of human culture.

G. Kasparov, Moscow, July 2003


In the preface of a book the reader and the writer are looking in opposite directions. For a reader the book is situated in the future. For the writer it's in the past. And the past is what this book is about. It's about the history of chess and about people from the chess world.
Having travelled the path of centuries, chess has completely changed its initial image of a nice way to pass the time for some bored Rajah. The motto of the Royal Theatre in Copenhagen - 'Not just for entertainment' - can be applied to modern chess. While for millions of chess fans it remains just a game, on the higher levels it became a sport and a science, and what is left artful is actually just one thing: the artful way to use the achievements of modern technology.
In many areas of life - music, literature, politics - when a person becomes famous he can rest on his laurels: his reputation will work for him. Chess is another story: you are only judged by your present achievements, not the old ones. There are no phony heroes in chess; it's impossible to discover a star today who lived at the same time with Capablanca but had passed unnoticed by his contemporaries, and it is impossible to discredit an outstanding player - because a player's reputation is only proved by the quality of his games and by his results. Chess requires continuous effort, a player must keep proving his class and reputation. That's why top-level chess has always been a difficult if not excruciating job.
Already in the 1930s Huizinga wrote that although chess is an increasingly serious and therefore cruel game, it still remains a game. Nowadays, it has become a sport more than ever. The more static a sport is, the more developed are the ways to analyse all the different situations and positions, and chess is the most characteristic example of such a sport. The informational explosion that we are all very familiar with, has very much affected chess too in the last decade.
Hundreds of games that are played in numerous tournaments be come public knowledge within a couple of hours from the actual playing time, and often they are broadcast live. Chess gets thoroughly researched and examined with the help of computers. The romantic fresco paintings covering chess have been removed, and numerous holes were exposed as a result. A magic spell has been removed from chess and it remains a big question for me whether ii will ever be possible to restore it.
When I replay the games of the great old masters and compare them with the modern games, I get the impression that the ruins of beauty are even more striking than beauty itself. However impressive modern glass-and-concrete buildings may be, the Pompei ruins are no less impressive. It is impossible to say which music is 'better' - old or modern - and in the same way we can't say what chess gives us more pleasure - Greco, Morphy, Steinitz, Capablanca, Tal or Kasparov. But fortunately chess is very versatile, and different people like different things about it.
It is very difficult to fairly judge the events of twenty, thirty, forty years ago from the position of present times. The realities of life are very flexible and transient. It is especially true when we talk about Soviet times, its rules, its laws - official or unwritten.
When I think about Soviet chess and about some of its concepts that become more and more vague and sometimes even incomprehensible for the new generations with every passing year, I ask myself if it is really necessary to preserve memories of this relatively narrow area of our culture? I think the answer to this question can only be a positive one. There is no doubt that every human experience is worth analysing and systematising, including that rather special experience on which modern chess is based. This allows us to make conclusions not only about the game itself but also about the system that facilitated its development.
When Herz studied the electromagnetic light theory he said that mathematical formulas have their own life. The same is true about chess, about its beauty and logic. Chess is more intelligent than we are - or even more intelligent than its creator. Modern chess can't
exist without using the French curves of the past. I tried to tell you about people that created these French curves. I wanted to write their names in the sand before the waves will erase them for ever and they will dissolve in the ocean of computer chess of the 21st century. Many of the people I write about, I met in person when I still physically lived in Leningrad, but in my mind already emigrated to the West. So the words that you'll read were written in the second half of my life, because at the time when the events took place I only had some vague feelings that I was not able to adequately express in words.
When, more than thirty years ago, I left the Soviet Union I wanted to leave all the past behind as soon as possible, but only after I put my seal on the past did I realise the difference between what I tried to run away from and what I regretted having left behind. For those who stayed in the USSR, I became a strange phenomenon: in contradiction with Saadi's sad saying: Some are deceased, others wander far away. I was for many both a distant friend and a deceased one.
My life in Leningrad was unfolding like an endless tape, but now I feel that time passes much faster for me. This is probably what everybody feels when approaching the end of the 'journey'... It is just like an hourglass that has been in use for a long time and its waist got wider, so the sand falls faster than when it was new. At the end of our lives we don't feel so much that we are getting older but that the world around us is getting younger. And most of all this applies to the chess world. It's a paradox that chess is becoming more and more complicated - but chess players' personalities are getting more and more primitive. Probably the reason is that top-level chess requires more time and effort and does not leave much space for other activities and hobbies.
In this book I also talk about people I met only after moving to the West. I tried to describe these people not only from the perspective of chess but also through their relations with other people and the society which is very different from what I experienced in the first half of my life. I tried to show what worries them, what they are like in communication with other people, what kind of mistakes they make, what tricks they use to reach their goals - which is not less interesting than their games. While talking about other people I was rediscovering my own self and overcoming the natural embarrassment that we all experience when we have to talk about ourselves.
In the hierarchy of modern values, chess takes a modest, a very modest place compared to literature, music, and even to practically all other sports. Moreover, the future prospects of chess are not at all clear. But trying to predict the future is senseless: we may get such surprises which neither pessimists nor optimists could think about in their wildest dreams. That is why I wrote about the past of chess, but in this past you will make many new and unexpected discoveries.

G. Sosonko, Amsterdam, July 2003
Weitere Informationen
EAN 9789056911140
Gewicht 320 g
Hersteller New in Chess
Breite 14,5 cm
Höhe 22 cm
Medium Buch
Erscheinungsjahr 2003
Autor Genna Sosonko
Sprache Englisch
Auflage 1
ISBN-10 9056911147
ISBN-13 9789056911140
Seiten 207
Einband kartoniert
007 Ode to a Free Man
by Garry Kasparov

011 Preface

016 The Cat that Walked by Himself
Tony Miles 1955 - 2001

030 Obsession
On the occasion of Viktor Kortchnoi's 70th birthday

040 Docendo Discimus
Vladimir Bagirov 1936 - 2000

060 Luka
Anatoly Lutikov 1933 - 1989

070 The Reliable Past
On the occasion of Rafael Vaganian's 50th birthday

080 The Club

097 My Testimony
Viktor Baturinsky 1914 - 2002

108 The Professor
Max Euwe 1901 - 1981

146 A Born Optimist
On the occasion of Jan Timman's 50th birthday

160 Essig Fleisch
Salo Flohr 1908 - 1983

173 Death of a Salesman
Eduard Gufeld 1936 - 2002

191 Beijing 2024

Auf der Suche nach den schönsten Schachbüchern der letzten Jahre stößt man schnell auf Genna Sosonkos 2001 erschienene Russian Silhouettes. Es versammelt Porträts von Schlüsselfiguren der sowjetischen Schachszene und beruht auf einer Artikelreihe Sosonkos in der Zeitschrift New in Chess, in der diese Porträts zuerst abgedruckt wurden. The Reliable Fast ist die Fortsetzung von Russian Silhouettes und diesmal werden mit Miles, Timman und Euwe auch wichtige westliche Spieler porträtiert. The Reliable Past steht seinem Vorgänger in nichts nach und gehört zu den herausragenden Publikationen dieses Jahres. Sosonko, der 1972 die Sowjetunion verließ, um nach Holland auszuwandern, war ein intimer Kenner der sowjetischen Schachszene. Zu den meisten der hier vorgestellten Personen pflegte er freundschaftlichen Kontakt - und das merkt man den Texten an.
Seine Darstellungen sind ebenso zeitlos wie bezaubernd. Selten liest man so sachkundige wie einfühlsame Würdigungen, die den Werdegang des Einzelnen mit der Geschichte verschmelzen. Die Präsentation von Einzelschicksalen in ihren historischen Dimensionen machen jedes seiner Porträts zu einem Juwel. Aus jeder Zeile spricht die Wärme, die der Autor seinem Gegenüber entgegenbringt, ohne dabei in einseitige Lobeshymnen zu verfallen. Die Menschen werden mit all ihren Stärken und Schwächen gezeigt, und dadurch sind die Porträts so überzeugend. Darüber hinaus erfährt der Leser viel über das Umfeld, die Atmosphäre und die handelnden Personen einer Epoche. Hier wird Schachgeschichte lebendig!
Besonders beeindruckend ist das mit „Essig Fleisch" überschriebene Porträt Salo Flohrs, der zusammen mit Keres auch das Titelbild ziert. Der kleine Mann, der aussah wie Charlie Chaplin, wurde von der FIDE nach seinem Sieg in Leningrad 1939 als Herausforderer des damaligen Weltmeisters Aljechin vorgeschlagen. Bekanntlich kam es nie zu diesem Match. Wie viele andere wurde Flohr ein Opfer des Krieges. In den Wirren der damaligen Zeit reiste er auf der Suche nach einem Land, das ihm Schutz bot, quer durch Europa und wanderte schließlich in die Sowjetunion aus. Er hat überlebt, doch die Ereignisse nie verwunden. Nach dem Krieg war er zwar immer
noch ein geschätzter Spieler, aber an seine frühere Spielstärke konnte er nicht mehr anknüpfen. Die Gründe dafür zeichnet Sosonko in subtilster Weise nach. Letztlich blieb Flohr heimatlos. Besonders anrührend ist die Anekdote um die entscheidende Hängepartie Botwinniks gegen Bronstein beim Wehmeisterschaftskampf 1951. Flohr war Sekundant seines alten Freundes Botwinnik. Die letzte und entscheidende Partie stand günstig für den Weltmeister, der bei Abbruch der Partie einen Zug ins Kuvert geben musste. Der beste Zug schien offensichtlich zu sein und Flohr analysierte diesen Zug die ganze Nacht. Aber Botwinnik traute niemandem und fürchtete sich vor Spionen. Als er zur Wiederaufnahme der Partie zur Bühne schritt, sagte er leise zu Flohr: „Du weißt, Salo, ich habe einen anderen Zug versiegelt." Flohrs Augen füllten sich mit Tränen. Diese Geschichte steht stellvertretend für Flohrs Leben, eben Essig Fleisch.

Schachmagazin Karl 03/2003


Ein reines Schach-Lesebuch, mit Artikeln über Miles, Kortschnoj, Bagirow, Lutikow, Waganjan, Baturinski (die graue Eminenz des UdSSR-Schachs), Euwe, Timman, Flohr, Gufeld und den Moskauer Zentralschachclub. Die einzelnen Artikel erschienen schon in der Zeitschrift New in Chess, überwiegend (nicht ausschließlich) als Nachruf. Es ist Literatur vom Feinsten und meilenweit von den üblichen nichtssagenden Huldigungen entfernt. Sosonko nimmt den Charakter seiner Protagonisten sehr genau unter die Lupe, verschweigt nicht deren Schattenseiten; doch alles ist stets dezent vorgetragen, niemals plump. Tony Miles, gegen den Sosonko rund 20 Partien austrug, war nicht immer nur der Gentleman am Brett, sarkastisch gegenüber seinen Gegnern, aber auch sich selbst. Ab 1987 hatte Miles mit psychischen Problemen zu kämpfen, man erfährt bei Sosonko etliches über die Hintergründe, ganz im Gegensatz zur zuvor vorgestellten Miles-Biographie. Überhaupt, Sosonko konzentriert sich in seinen Schilderungen auf die Zeit des langsamen Niedergangs seiner Protagonisten: wie die Erfolge nachließen, wie sie an Gewicht zulegten... Beschreibt, wie so manche Schachlegende im fortgeschrittenen Alter, ausgerüstet mit Sporttasche und Plastiktüte, auf Openturnieren im Kampf gegen die jüngere Generation ihr Glück versuchte. Fast scheint es, als hätte Sosonko ein morbides Vergnügen an Schilderungen vom Niedergang - ein Niedergang, von dem er selbst verschont bleibt: Der 60-Jährige, der 1972 als noch unbekannter Meister die Sowjetunion verließ und sich in seiner besten Zeit um 1980 in Weltklasseturnieren behaupten konnte, spielt selbst zuletzt kaum noch; er hat diese Art der Open-Prostitution auch nicht nötig.
Selten gab ein Buch einen so intimen Einblick in das Leben von Schachgrößen, in menschliche Beziehungen unter Profis. Und das auf eine schriftstellerisch überzeugende Weise. Selbst Baturinski, im Westen verhasster sowjetischer Delegationsleiter bei den WM-Duellen zwischen Karpow und Kortschnoj, wird als facettenreiche Persönlichkeit geschildert. In einem Interview, das Sosonko 1999 mit dem damals 85-jährigen und fast blinden Baturinski (er starb 2002) führte, spürt man so etwas wie gegenseitige Vergebung. Sosonko selbst verachtete das kommunistische System, bewahrte sich aber dennoch - trotz der frühen Auswanderung (er war einer der ersten Schachmeister, der die Sowjetunion verließ) - seine Liebe für die Heimat und seine Liebe für die Zeit einer klassischen Schachkultur: Stellvertretend hierfür seine Schilderung des Niedergangs des Moskauer Zentralschachklubs, dem einstigen Tempel der Schachkultur.

Harald Keilhack, Schach 01/2004


Vor einigen Jahren erschien bei New In Chess "Russian Silhouettes", eine Sammlung von interessanten Porträts großer Schachspieler aus der Feder von Genna Sosonko. Hauptdarwaren damals die großen Verdes sowjetischen Schachs.
Mit seinem neuen Buch "The Reliable Fast" schlägt Sosonko nun die Brücke in den Westen, wo er nach seiner Übersiedlung nach Holland im Jahre 1972 natürlich ebenfalls engen Kontakt mit den Großen des Schachs knüpfte.
Wir begegnen dem leider früh verTony Miles auf verschiedeStationen seiner Karriere.
Ein Bild zeigt ihn z.B. bei seinem schlagzeilenträchtigen Auftritt beim stark besetzten Turnier Tilburg 1985, bei dem er aufgrund starker Rückenschirerzen nur noch auf eiMassagetisch liegend spielen konnte und dennoch den geteilten Turniersieg schaffte.
Weiter geht es mit den niederländischen Legenden Jan Timman und Max Euwe, dem Sosonko das größte Kapitel des Buches widaber natürlich erzählt Sosonko auch wieder über Spieler, die wie er dem sowjetischen Schach entstamAls weitere prominente Figuren sind beispielsweise Viktor Kortschnoi, Rafael Waganjan, Salo Flohr oder Eduard Gufeld zu nennen.
Doch Sosonko erzählt auch von anderen Spielern wie Bagirow oder Lutikow, er besucht den "Club", den Mittelpunkt des sowjetischen Schachs, und schwelgt in Erinnerunoder treibt in einer ironischen Geschichte über eine zukünftige Weltmeisterschaft einige Vorkommin der Schachszene auf die Spitze.
Bei all dem gelingt es Sosonko, sehr einfühlsam über die Menschen zu berichten, die hinter den Fassander Spieler stecken, und von ihrem Leben und ihrer Beziehung zum königlichen Spiel zu erzählen.
Viele Bilder runden das sehr schöne und wunderbar zu lesende Buch ab, man sollte allerdings einigermaßen gut Englisch können, um das Buch auch richtig genießen zu können.

Schachmarkt 02/2004