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World Chess Championship 1957 and 1958 (Hardinge Simpole Chess Classics S.)

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This book combines the account and eye witness analysis by Golombek of the second and third of the three titanic world title clashes between Botvinnik and Smyslov, unquestionably the dominant players of the 1950s. The games and notes to the 1958 match, written for the British Chess Magazine at the time, have never previously been published in book form. (A companion volume, also published by Hardinge Simpole, covers the 1954 match.) Botvinnik was the iron man of Soviet chess while Smyslov, by crushing the world's greatest players at the Candidates Tournaments of 1953 and 1956, had proved himself the most worthy challenger. These games are bloodthirsty classics between two supreme exemplars of the soviet school of chess, annotated by the man on the spot who had unrivalled access both to the players and to the very best of Soviet analysis. Harry Golombek was perhaps the king of chess writers. Chess correspondent for The London Times and The Observer, he possessed an unrivalled gift for transforming a chess game into an heroic saga with himself as the bard, singing the exploits of his chosen heroes of the mind. Several times British Champion, Golombek also played top board for England in the Olympiad and represented the British Chess Federation in the FIDE World Championship cycle. He was fluent in Russian and personally attended the World Chess Championships of 1954, 1957 and 1958 as a judge.

between them botvinnik and smyslov dominated world championship chess in the 1950's. smyslov defeated botvinnik in 1957 but botvinnik roared right back the following year. this book contains all the games with deep notes from both matches by a grandmaster who was present in moscow throughout.