From: Peter Marko <pmarko@bnr.ca>
Subject: F-S II Interview w/GM Szabo
Organization: Northern Telecom Canada Ltd.
X-Useragent: Nuntius v1.1
Date: Mon, 5 Oct 1992 16:34:36 GMT

Thought you might be interested in an interview with international
grandmaster SZABO Laszlo of Hungary on the Fischer-Spassky match (please
note that family name comes first in Hungarian).  Also interviewed is dr.
POPPER Peter, a well-known Hungarian psychologist.  The discussion took
place when Spassky was leading 2-1.  The transcipt of the interview
appeared in the September 22 issue of the Hungarian weekly "- 168 ora -"
(- 168 hours -).  Translation by me (please excuse the rough edges...). 
The entire article appears below (without permission).

"There is no democracy in chess
                     AND FISCHER, HIS PROPHET...
                    Who does not give up the game

Is there comeback after twenty years?  Can he, having left as a king and
a controversial hero, get back to the top of his sports career?  There is
no comeback - said virtually everybody when the news spread about Bobby
Fischer sitting down again to the table with the one he once beat, the
French-turned-Soviet Boris Spassky.  MOLNAR Daniel asked dr. POPPER Peter
psychologist and international grandmaster SZABO Laszlo to solve the
Fischer-phenomenon at a time when the interviewees could not yet know
what we now know: the chess phenomenon wins all the time, smiles
sometimes, and - considering his past - behaves quite normally.

  - What kinds of psychological motives does the psychologist think are
behind the comeback?

dr. POPPER Peter (PP):  - For me there is something touchingly and
shockingly beautiful in that which is probably silly from the sport's or
the chessplayer's point of view.  I perfectly understand if Kasparov
qualifies Fischer's comeback laughable - considering the performance, the
production, it is surely laughable, since one cannot leave for decades
without a negative effect -, but I think there is still something
wonderfully beautiful in this resurrection in a humane or a psychological
sense.  I feel a very humane, shocking, touching and hopeless revolt
against time, aging, and the performance deterioration that comes with
age; that is, a revolt against human misery.  I know that Fischer's
character is not like that.  He is more defiant, more provocative, he is
crazier, more of a psychopath; that is, I may be 'dreaming this on'
Fischer.

  - SZABO Laszlo could readily help us find the answer since he knows
Bobby Fischer quite closely.

SZABO Laszlo (SzL):  - I have played him four times.  In Portoroz - when
he was still very young - at the interzonal; then there was a tournament
in Buenos Aires, where he failed very badly; then in Cuba, where he was
not 'close' at all.  For that was the first time he took on the American
government.  He had been invited to Cuba.  At that time no American
athlete could receive permission to enter Cuba.  It was probably very
good propaganda for Fidel Castro because it was arranged so we could play
via telex: Bobby in America - in New York, I think - and we at the board,
on location.  This was a big disadvantage for us.  So, then already, he
got around the law somehow.
  I feel that, above all, money plays a big role here.  For I would find
it very odd if, for example, a wordclass athlete like Nurmi - who was
then known and respected by the entire world - came back after 15-20
years.  He himself would realize that he would be unable to compete with
today's athletes.

  - I am not sure that everybody would realize this.  Let me cite the
example of Mark Spitz, who won seven gold medals at the 1972 Munich
Olympics.  In 1992 he once again jumped in the pool and took part in the
American qualifiers to earn the right to participate at the Olympics.  It
is another matter that he then could not produce one of the first three
spots; nevertheless, he had said that he wanted to win at the Olympics,
or at least qualify for the finals.  Spitz did not succed.

PP:  - Somehow, this is in the air.  Borg has also tried to come back in
tennis, if not after such a long absence.  I think there is an element of
obsessive behaviour in Fischer; I believe that he is convinced that if
there was a chess god, then Fischer would be his prophet.  Surely the
stakes are enormous when he starts to play.  We know people - and this is
not an illness, I do not consider this abnormal - who just cannot finish
things.

  - A chess journalist once said when writing about Bobby Fischer that
there was no democracy in chess.  Chess is a monarchy with Fischer as its
chess king, and a good king at that - said this chessplayer - since he
did everything to further the acknowledgement and monetary advancement of
chessplayers.  While he was the king, Fischer was also giving the orders.
 And he was giving strict orders.

PP:  - To me Fischer has been living without acknowledging that his
kingdom had passed.  That is, for himself he has remained the king for 20
years.  He has not come out of his palace.  He has not shown himself to
the people.  How does defeat effect a chessplayer?  I think this is
unpredictable.  I know one thing: the effect will be extreme.

SzL:  - He was staying the next door to me when we played each other in
Buenos Aires.  One grandmaster took a lady up to him.  I do not know how
long she stayed there; the next morning, though, when we stepped out of
our rooms at the exact same moment, Fischer said: 'chess is better'.

  - I wonder why Fischer accepted to play this match at Sveti Stefan?

PP:  - I do not think it is quite certain that this fine Fischer lives
entirely in this world, concerning the political, historical, topical,
economic and military sides of things.  I believe he lives so much under
the spell of chess that these are third-rate questions to him.

  - So we should not say that what Fischer is doing is unethical .

PP:  - I would not pass judgment.

SzL:  - I would suggest that we not even mention such things in this
interview.  I have read that he is still doing the same thing he used to:
he collects every article about himself that is ever published anywhere
in the world.

  - What can we expect?  Right now it seems that Fischer is not strong
enough to defeat Spassky since the same Fischer who 20 years ago beat
Spassky 12-3 or 12-4 [I think it was 12.5-8.5 - PM], Petrosian 6-2,
Larsen 6-0, this Fischer is now trailing 2-1 against Spassky who is not
part of the youngest generation either.

SzL:  - The many excuses that he brings up all the time, the more and
more excuses and Spassky's lead make me strongly doubt that he will go on
with this match.  I think it will be discontinued, even more so after
seeing one of his games: Fischer has never made such a mistake before.

PP:  - I see human greatness in undertaking an adventure like this at age
50, accepting the risk of failure; then he fails hysterically, of course,
and fails badly.  One thing is for sure: people have become extremely
interested in this.  It was good for chess.  For Fischer is an
interesting man.

SzL:  - I consider this negative.  The fact that, while he wants to come
back, he runs the others down - well, Karpov is not my ideal either, but
Kasparov! -, he writes about how they have ruined chess.  He should
explain what this is based on!

PP:  - We should not expect objectivity from Fischer.  He lives in his
own closed world, the Fischer-cosmos."

---------------------------------------------------------------
Peter Marko    .....    (613)763-5344    .....    pmarko@bnr.ca
Northern Telecom Canada Ltd.   .....    Ottawa, Ontario, Canada