My Most Memorable Interviews: 35 Conversations with Chess Stars

by Devreese

Overview

The interviews in this book span over twenty years, over two decades. For years I went with my recording device to tournaments like Wijk aan Zee, Frankfurt Chess Classic, Hoogeveen... often to interview the interesting player of the moment in some hotel bar or quiet interview room. 31 out of the 35 interviews came about this way. That is… until March 2020, when out of nowhere, covid broke out. Suddenly chess tournaments were no longer held and a live interview with chess players was no longer possible.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9789464201628
Publisher:	Thinkers Publishing
Publication date:	01/17/2023
Pages:	474
Product dimensions:	6.70(w) x 9.25(h) x 1.30(d)

About the Author

 

Gert Devreese (born 1962) is a well-known Belgian chess journalist and since 1989 national editor at the Belgian paper De Standaard.  Gert is a chess player himself and is since many years fascinated by the intriguing personalities of famous chess players, their rivalries and friendships, the things that happen behind the curtains in the fascinating chess world, their interests outside chess…

That’s why Gert has been written since about three decades a lot of articles and interviews about chess for his own paper De Standaard, and (until 2008) the late Dutch chess magazine Schaaknieuws. From the year 2000 on, Gert became the regular interviewer of the magazine of the Dutch Chess Federation Schaakmagazine. In that magazine he was given space to make large, in depth interviews with the best players of the last two decades, as well people of the Kasparov as of the Carlsen generation. Celebrities such as Kortchnoi, Kasparov, Karpov, Kramnik, Topalov, Anand, Polgar, Kosteniuk… told Gert candid about their lives and their chess. They were followed by the Carlsen generation, people like Caruana, Nakamura, Aronian, Giri…

Gert Devreese enjoyed the rare privilege to be able to interview the great names (and many others) in the chess world from 2000 until now. He thought it would be a great idea to make a compilation of the most memorable of his interviews. Out of the harvest of dozens of conversations with top players, 35 interviews made the final selection. It’s a nice and intriguing travel through the recent history of chess on the one hand, but Gert also treats hot chess topics like chess in Covid times, Twitch and online chess, and the recent successful series The Queen’s Gambit.

Table of Contents

Preamble Jeroen van den Berg 6

Preamble from the Author 8

Part I World Champions 13

Ch 1 "I haven't discovered anything human in Karpov yet" 15

Ch 2 "A roaring beast is better kept in its cage" 31

Ch 3 "Putin is no better than Mugabe" 43

Ch 4 "My first name is still Vladimir, not 'world champion'" 59

Ch 5 "I can never match Kasparov" 77

Ch 6 "In India chess is now exploding" 93

Ch 7 "I can always win, against anyone" 101

Ch 8 "My colleagues see me as a man" 111

Ch 9 "I am a chess star first, then a photo model" 127

Ch 10 "I have a lot to learn from Polgar" 141

Part II World Toppers 2010-Now 221

Ch 11 "I have as much chance at the world title as the others" 151

Ch 12 "Chess in the US has to boom again as under Fischer" 161

Ch 13 "I owe it to Armenia to become world champion" 175

Ch 14 "I've a chance at the world title for many years to come" 187

Ch 15 "Apart from Kasparov and Karpov, I was clearly the best" 195

Ch 16 "After eight years, I wanted to play a real tournament" 207

Ch 17 "I am in a sombre period as far as chess is concerned" 217

Part III World Toppers 1999-2010 225

Ch 18 "Fischer? Every chess player is a little crazy" 227

Ch 19 "Kasparov is a cheat, Kramnik an immoral cynic" 243

Ch 20 "I've done nothing but play chess all my life" 259

Ch 21 "That wasn't childish, that was war!" 267

Ch 22 "Kasparov wants to play Kramnik for the rest of his life" 283

Ch 23 "Kasparov has long ceased to be a scary monster" 289

Ch 24 "I want to perform like Fischer or Kasparov" 299

Ch 25 "I'm actually middle-aged" 307

Ch 26 "My time has not yet come" 313

Ch 27 "I'd rather enjoy my life than be in the 2700 club" 329

Ch 28 "Chess is about survival" 341

Ch 29 "I don't play chess for money or fame, but for myself" 355

Part IV Science: Psychology, Computers And Composing 367

Ch 30 "Just go back and fight" 369

Ch 31 "That one mistake in a series of moves, Fritz will see it" 393

Ch 32 "I feel rich inside" 405

Part V Covid Times: Chess Dip And Boom 415

Ch 33 "I have not forgotten how to play chess" 417

Ch 34 "I often win on Twitch against IM's and even GM's" 437

Ch 35 "The Queen's Gambit has more impact on chess than Fischer" 455

Thank you! 473

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

Long, written interviews: they still exist! Preparing,conducting and writing out long and readable interviews is a craft that seems to be slowly disappearing with the passing of time. After all, everything has to be done faster and faster these days. And the influence of social media is huge. Fortunately, there are still the necessary exceptions: several newspapers post full-page interviews (or even longer, but usually in the weekend editions), so for enthusiasts like myself, there is still the possibility to enjoy long, written interviews. Still, I have a certain fear that such long stories are going to disappear. Or return only in book form, for the target audience that loves them. Partly for this reason, it is gratifying that Gert Devreese has published his best and most beautiful chess interviews in book form! I hope that young people will also enjoy this, because the dynamic between a trained interviewer and an interesting interviewee is shown to its best advantage in the written word. Gert interviewed virtually all the top chess players for both his newspaper De Standaard and for the Dutch magazine Schaakmagazine. The latter magazine is also an interface between Gert and myself. When I was still making interviews myself, with the same drive that Gert still has, I was once in Leon, Spain for Schakend Nederland (the predecessor of Chess Magazine) for the Advanced Duel Kasparov–Topalov. I preferred to make my stories as long as possible – just as Gert still does. It was June 1998. The two players were allowed to use a computer as an aid, which was an interesting experiment at the time, because the computer was not yet as strong as it is now. The final score was 3-3 and Gert and I met in the press room. We talked about chess players, chess in general and the influence of the computer. But we also talked about sports and especially about soccer, because soccer was a common interest of ours, as it soon became clear. So an appointment was made to watch the Netherlands–Belgium match somewhere together. This match was scheduled during that period when we were in sunny Leon. The match ended in a scoreless draw. A year later I became the tournament director at Wijk aan Zee, which I still am today. I then consciously chose to give up all my chess journalism work and opted definitively for the organizational side – a choice I have never regretted, although I did continue to do interviews with footballers for a long time. These were usually long stories too, because that interest remained. By a special kind of coincidence, Gert took over my role as interviewer for the KNSB chess magazine after I stopped there. Precisely for that reason it was so nice that we had already met in Leon in 1998. And fortunately he did that job with an enormous passion, so chess lovers from Belgium and the Netherlands have been able to enjoy his stories for about twenty years now. I like the fact that a publisher has now been found to compile his best stories. The biggest names pass by: Kasparov, Karpov, Timman, Carlsen, Polgar, Kortchnoi, Anand, Caruana, Giri, Hou Yifan... This is just a sample, all portrayed at a time when they were in the spotlight in one way or another. The power of a good interviewer is that he prepares well. And that is what Gert does. Moreover, he is also conscientious in the elaboration of his stories. He checks facts and calls or emails the interviewee if something is not clear to him or needs explanation. I hope thereader enjoys reading this book. Jeroen van den Berg, Summer 2022.  

Those looking for a chess book to read cover to cover for pleasure, picking up some chess culture along the way, will find Belgian journalist Gert Devreese’s massive tome My Most Memorable Interviews just the thing. This book includes interviews with top players and other interesting figures in the chess world the past twenty odd years. This is the rare chess book that can be recommended no matter what the reader’s rating is. IM JOHN DONALDSON JANUARY 2023

Interviews

During the realization of most of the interviews in this book I was also fortunate that most of the top chess players were easy to approach, did not have any attitude and were usually open to an interview. Most of them, that is. But there were also the real Living Legends. Like Magnus Carlsen (what's in a name?). When Magnus was a rising star in his twenties, I could interview him at Wijk aan Zee. But in recent years Carlsen has adopted the habit of only allowing interview sessions one at a time in Wijk aan Zee to particular journalists. I have always thanked him for that. For me, a good interview must happen face-to-face, one-on-one; I want to be able to determine the scenario of the interview myself, and make adjustments if necessary. The interview with Carlsen in this book is one of those, because at the tournament in Leuven, Belgium, I was fortunate enough to catch Carlsen separately. And then there is The Boss – Garry Kasparov himself. I myself will never forget one particular moment with Kasparov. There was a very pleasant atmosphere in the press room at Wijk aan Zee – was it 1999, 2000 or 2001? The players were sitting around after their games laughing and joking with each other. There was an exuberant atmosphere. Suddenly, however, all the conversations fell silent and a deadly hush ensued. How comes? Garry Kasparov, after his long game, had suddenly entered the press room. In one second it became crystal clear to me: there was Kasparov, and then there were the others. This is a theme that comes up several times in the conversations in this book. Kasparov was a special case, also for journalists. During his pro career, I only had the opportunity to interview Kasparov separately once, coincidentally during the Advanced Chess Match against Topalov, which also turns up in the Foreword by the Tata tournament director Jeroen van den Berg. But after his pro career, to my delight, Kasparov suddenly became much more accessible to journalists: he wrote many books, and wanted to put his political fight with Putin in the spotlight. As a result, I was able to ask him, albeit many years later, the key questions about his first five-month marathon match with Karpov, questions that had been on my mind for a long time.