my goodness! i was just talking about him to my wife last night.

he was something else. when he clobbered spassky, i was young and impressed by the crushing power he exerted through chess. -that he was able to. nothing else ever seemed as much a blood 'sport' to me since.

beyond what he showed can be done simply through tournament chess, his persona was the first contemporary example of mercilessness i'd ever seen in a public venue. he might as well have gone to the university of chicago in '68 and had leo strauss himself for a professor. i know nothing of him personally, directly, but i take from what i've read of him that he was something else entirely -maybe not a monster per se' and maybe not crazy per se' but something else entirely. certainly a genius.

he inspired me to invest years in chess and it did me ill. it took a long time to give it up entirely. i still have my pieces and naugahyde board but refuse to play any more.... weird, yes. it's like a reformed gunfighter having his guns still stashed somewhere!

i remember reading an interview with garry kasparov (in playboy i believe) and i was impressed with his sanity and political aspirations and views but thought him way too sane and healthy to achieve in chess what bobby did -and figured he figured the same.

god rest his strange soul. i can only imagine his views on what america has become...

man... i can't believe he's dead. or that he was even truly mortal. god actually checkmated the guy! amazing! impossible even.

suffice it to say he had a profound impact on me when i was but the tender age of 18.