Searching for Bobby Fischer

Den klassiske boka av Fred Waitzkin om han og sønnen Josh fra han første gang spilte sjakk 6 år gammel og til han spilte om det amerikanske mesterskapet. En bok om et vidunderbarn i sjakk, men også en rørende bok om far og sønn. Den har vært en suksess både som bok og senere som film.

Josh Waitzkin ble enda senere blant annet en sterk sjakkspiller og er selv kjent for boka "The Art of Learning" og som sjakktreneren for de populære Chessmaster-produktene.

En ny paperback-utgave på 226 sider.

Ever since he started playing tournament chess at age seven, Josh Waitzkin, an athletic, fun-loving, not overly studious boy, has been among the top-rated players of his age group in the U.S. He is now 11. The troubled relationship between son and father, a talented but amateur chess buff, torn between ambitions for the prodigy and guilt at exploiting him, develops here against a background of chess clubs, seedy game parlors and Washington Square populated by a colorful gallery of Manhattan chess loversmasters, hustlers, Russian emigre teachers and doting parents.

In marked contrast, notes the author, is the hero status of chess champions in Russia and the palatial setting of competitions like the Moscow Hall of Columns where he and his son attended the 1984 Karpov-Kasparov matches, which may have been not only state-supported but politically controlled, he contends. What, the author wonders, will become of Fischer's legacy of a promising generation of young American players following their idol's premature retirement from chess and society?