Hello, Readers you might have heard about a proverb “Jack of
all trades, but master of none” however, never about “master of all trades but
jack of none” which will exactly suite the 5th World Chess Champion Machgielis
Euwe popularly known as Max Euwe.
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| Max Euwe- 5th World Champion |
He was the very best in every activity under
taken throughout his life. He was a fine mathematician (who invented theorems
about the infinite sequence of 0 and 1’s with no 3 identical consecutive sub
sequences of any length), an engineer, an astronomer, computer genius, world
chess champion and by the end of his life became President of FIDE who has
witnessed the realm Fischer and Karpov.
The Dutch genius never been regarded as
a professional chess player, but, he had an exceptional acumen for the Royal
game and with all the knowledge he laid a solid foundation for the evaluation
of computer chess during his time.
Max Euwe was born on 20 May 1901 in Watergraafsmeer, near
Amsterdam, Netherlands. He learnt chess from his parents Elisabeth and
Cornelius Euwe at the age of 5 and soon start winning against them. He excelled
in mathematics when he was in school at Amsterdam. In 1911, when he was just 10
years old, he played his first chess tournament, a one day Christmas congress
and won every game. He became a member of the Amsterdam chess club when he was
twelve years old and by the time he was fourteen he was playing in the Dutch
Chess Federation tournaments.
From 1921 to 1952 Euwe participated in many Dutch
Chess Championship and won all the tournaments. His 12 titles in the Dutch
Championship are the record still holds today. In 1928 at Hague he became World
Ametuer Chess Championship.
After the end of World War I, Euwe made his first trip abroad
to participate in the famous Hastings Chess Tournament in England where he
secured fourth place. In 1930 he won the Hastings tournament ahead of
Capablanca. However in a Euwe - Capablanca match which was played later Euwe
lost 0 wins to 2 with 8 draws. The year 1932 was a very successful one beating
Spielmann, drawing twice with Flohr and taking second place behind Alekhine in
a tournament in Berne.
During 1933-34 he played very little chess while he
concentrated on mathematics. Then, in the summer of 1935, he challenged
Alekhine; the match began on 3 October. It was held at twenty-three different
locations in Amsterdam, The Hague, Delft, Rotterdam, Utrecht, Gouda, Groningen,
Baarn, Hertogenbosch, Eindhoven, Zeist, Ermelo, and Zandvoort.
The dramatic result of his first match against Alekhine is old
history. Three points down after seven games, he pulled up to equality, only to
see his redoubtable opponent draw away again. Battling gamely, he was still two
down at the two-thirds stage, but won the twentieth, twenty-first,
twenty-fifth, and twenty-sixth games and retained his grip on a now desperate
adversary to the end. On Dec. 15, 1935 Euwe defeated Alekhine and became 5th
World Chess Champion. He was trained by Geza Maroczy for the world
championship.
Euwe was the first player to study openings with scientific
precision. His repertoire was designed to prevent Alekhine from unfolding his
best chess qualities. He was the first to begin preparing professionally for
world championship matches by giving more attention to physical, practical and
theoretical preparation. His greatest strength is tactical and combinative
play. He had written many chess columns and books which are very instructive in
nature. If you add Euwe's talent for precise calculation, his sense of
initiative plus his outstanding nervous constitution, you can see where
Alekhine's problems came from. Forced to play without the initiative, the
Russian made many mistakes, mainly due to psychological impatience.
Euwe is the essence of caution. To win the world's
championship and to secure a place only half a point behind the winner on
caution alone is impossible, there must be depth and imagination, but the outstanding
impression to be gained from his games is caution and dogged perseverance.
Despite this overall impression of caution, it is worth noting
that Euwe shared the prize for the most wins in his score during the
tournament. While Euwe was World Champion he changed the way that players
competed for the title. From that time on the rights to organise World
Championship matches was given to FIDE (Fédération Internationale des échecs -
the World Chess Federation). The one exception was the return match between
Euwe and Alekhine which went ahead according to the conditions already arranged
at the time of the first match.
In his return match with Alekhine things went badly for Euwe
after winning the first game, and he lost the match by a margin of five points.
Various reasons have been put forward as to why he was defeated so heavily, but
the main reason was almost certainly the fact that his advisor, Reuben Fine,
had taken ill with appendicitis and could not assist him.
After this Euwe went through a rather bad spell as regards his
chess. His teaching duties made it difficult for him to concentrate on
tournaments and in the Dutch championship which followed his defeat as World
Champion he could only play matches in the evening as he had teaching
commitments through the day. For other tournaments, although he did receive
time off from his teaching duties to play, he had no time to prepare as he
would teach up to the last moment.
During the war Euwe led work to provide food for people
through an underground charity organisation. After the war he won the London
Tournament in 1946 and it looked for a while as though he might challenge again
for the World Championship. However after some impressive play in the couple of
years following the war, he then began to look past his best. Euwe became
interested in electronic data processing and was appointed as Professor of
Cybernetics in 1954. In 1957 he visited the United States to study computer
technology in that country. While in the United States he played two unofficial
chess games in New York against Bobby Fischer, winning one and drawing the
second.
He was appointed director of The Netherlands Automatic Data
Processing Research Centre in 1959. He was chairman, from 1961 to 1963, of a
committee set up by Euratom to examine the feasibility of programming computers
to play chess. Then, in 1964, he was appointed to a chair in automatic
information processing in Rotterdam University and, following that, at Tilburg
University. He retired as professor at Tilburg in 1971.
In 1970 Euwe was elected the president of FIDE and held that
position until 1978. His role as arbitrator of the Fischer - Spassky World
Championship match in Reykjavik, Iceland in 1972 was a very difficult one which
he carried out with great tact and skill. He was unfortunate that during his
time as president negotiations for the World Championship match between Fischer
and Karpov became extremely difficult. Euwe made huge efforts to ensure that
the match was played but, unfortunately, despite every effort eventually the
match had to be awarded to Karpov by default.
In 1981, Max Euwe died of heart attack at the age of 80,
leaving the history as a chess player. Max Euwe is the only person to beat
Alekhine in a world championship match.
In his view a world champion should love chess more than his
own life and of course more than his own fame. He should love chess like
Steinitz and process the endurance of Lasker, the tact of Capablanca, the
intelligence of Chigorin, the fury of Alekhine, the educated thinking of
Botvinnik, the discretion of Smyslov, the audacity of Tal, the imperturbability
of Spassky, the ambition of Fischer and the calmness of Karpov.
We can see the greatness of Euwe in the words of elite chess
players below:
In the words of Botvinnik, Euwe is an extremely impetuous,
active player. Even when defending he is always aiming for counter play. He
likes to play on the flanks. He likes positions without weaknesses, with some
freedom, and he makes disconcerting long moves. He aims for development. With
the positions advantage he does not avoid exchanges, but satisfies himself with
a better endgame. He exploits mistakes excellently. With a material advantage
(a pawn, the exchange), he plays with redoubled strength. He has a subtle,
excellent technique, not without tricks. In general he is a very good
tactician. He knows the openings very well.
In the words of Smyslov, Euwe was familiar with facets of
versatile chess activity: His books showed that he was a splendid teacher, the
novelties employed in his games and his analyses in chess magazines showed that
he was an outstanding theoretician. His aggressive handling of the opening on a
realistic positional base, and his unexpected manoeuvres, his amazing skill in
finding a veiled way out of a difficult position demonstrated the Dutch
grandmaster is a wonderful tactical gift. Later he was also able to appreciate
fully the other fine qualities of the fifth world champion- Industriousness,
stamina, self-control and his gentleman-like attitude to his opponents.
In the words of Tal, Max Euwe was world champion for only two
years, but his services to chess were very great. Tal said that Euwe was a
genius of organisation. Through preparation exceptional concentration, strength
of will anybody can learn from Euwe.
In the words of Petrosian, “I was 13 or 14 when Euwe’s
manuals, which have now become bibliographic rarities, fell into my hands, I
still remember well that his course of chess lectures was my favourite book and
I studied it very thoroughly.
In the words of Spassky “the fact the Euwe played better in
the 1935 match is quite obvious. The fact that although not a professional, he
nevertheless managed to defeat Alekhine must be regarded as a competitive and
creative feat and in addition the quality of the games was pretty high. By
winning against Alekhine he thereby joined the galaxy of chess stars.”
In the words of Karpov, “I have the warmest memories of Max
Euwe. I will not forget that moment when, as FIDE president he laid the laurel
wreath on me and wished me well, expressing his confidence that I would not
become “king for a day”. His course of chess lectures is one of the first books
from which I gained an impression of the ways that chess though develops, and
about the contribution to chess of its first classics. The games of Euwe
himself in which the logic for a mathematician is combined with keen
combinative vision demonstrate that his surge in the mid-1930s and his ascent
to the top of chess were quire logical.
Euwe’s entire life is an example of
selfless devotion to chess.
Max Euwe’s opening repertoire for white with 1.d4 in PGN format can be downloaded here:
| http://sabercathost.com/5J9 |
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