Light up the Sky

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080118/ap_ ... it_fischer

REYKJAVIK, Iceland - Bobby Fischer, the reclusive chess genius who became a Cold War hero by dethroning the Soviet world champion in 1972 and later renounced his American citizenship, has died. He was 64.

Fisher died in a Reykjavik hospital on Thursday of kidney failure after a long illness, his spokesman, Gardar Sverrisson, said Friday.

Born in Chicago and raised in Brooklyn, N.Y., Fischer faced criminal charges in the United States for playing a 1992 rematch against Boris Spassky in Yugoslavia in defiance of international sanctions. In 2005, he moved to Iceland, a chess-mad nation and site of his greatest triumph.

As a champion, he used his eccentricities to unsettle opponents, but Fischer's reputation as a genius of chess was soon eclipsed, in the eyes of many, by his idiosyncrasies.

"Chess is war on a board," he once said. "The object is to crush the other man's mind."

64 squares on a Chessboard.

Bobby Fischer dead... aged 64.

..... wonderfully uncanny, I thought.

Uncanny indeed...coincidences like that give me goosebumps!

What did he die of?

It was reported that the cause of death was liver failure.

I knew Bobby would self-medicate. This was because of his paranoia over being poisoned by either the Jews, the CIA or the Communists. I remember reading that he always carried a suitcase full of pills and the like, "I'm not going to make it easy for them" he used to say.

I've been fascinated with his off-the-Chessboard life for years. Anti-Semitism, Communist Plots, American Overlords, Jesus Theories, Political Sanctions... Bobby was caught up in it all. Of course, the Media tell us he was mad. Interesting, I'd call it

A brilliant Chess-mind and a fascinating man. Thats my own appraisal of Bobby Fischer.

Skitzophrinia? Sure sounds like it. R.I.P. Bobby Fisher

Chess Savant, maybe... social-idiot, probably.

My guess would be that he thought 'Life' was like playing Chess. Every move would be stratified 10 moves ahead and every move against him would result in a counter-attack.

Paranoia is a great gift to the gifted.

Dude, are you a master at chess? Or did you just watch his movie?

Not a Master, but I do play and generally win at Blitz Chess online.

What's "Blitz Chess" as opposed to regular chess?

Basically its a much-much faster game, rav.

5 'digital' minutes are alloted per player; the online version I play adds 5 seconds to the clock per move. There are other variations in which the time controls can be as low as 1 minute.

Tournament Chess has time controls of up to 120 minutes. In an online situation that wouldn't work well, the concentration factor of playing a physical game wouldnt be there, it would also be very costly (especially when the net started up), so rapid chess is the cyber-game of choice.

Bobby Fischer 'Watching' was a staple on most sites.

He died of bad movie disease.

Well, Bruce Willis is fucked then.

And Keanu Reeves!

LMAO.

Yep those 2 will be in hell.