-
Birth
Fischer was born March 9, 1943 -
Period: to
Early Years
Fischer was born in Chicago. He was raised by her mother who was a single parent. He learned how to play chess at the age of six. He instantly fell in love. He found tutelage under Carmine Nigro. Fischer would also join the Manhattan Chess Club at 12. -
The Game of the Century
At just the age of 13, Fischer played the Third Lessing J Rosenwald Trophy Tournament. Even though he could only manage 4.5 / 11. He played a brilliancy against master Donald Byrne. The game is often called the Game of the Century. -
Gm/Candidates
Bobby Fischer would become a GM and qualify for the Candidates in the same tournament. He was by far the youngest to do both of those things. -
Candidate's Tournament
Bobby lost to Mikhail Tal 4-0 and reportedly burst into tears. He placed a little under half. -
Another Failure
Fischer would again qualify for the Candidates in the next cycle, but he would only place 4th out of 8 people. He later blamed his poor results on the Soviets banding together to stop him by making quick draws with each other. Then they would fight vigorously against Bobby. -
Another Candidates?
Fischer would opt out of competing for the next Candidates cycle as FIDE (the international Chess federation) refused to yield to Fischer's demands. This would be a common theme with Fischer, who was very problematic to deal with. -
Period: to
Semi Retirement
Bobby would leave active tournament play for about a year. -
What about this time?
Bobby Fischer would compete in another Interzonal tournament to qualify for the Candidates. However, while Fischer was leading 8.5/10, his observance of the Worldwide Church of God's seventh-day Sabbath required him to miss key rest days. This caused Fischer to forfeit 2 games in protest and he ended up withdrawing. -
Period: to
A Final Push
Fischer began his efforts to become a World Champion anew, in 1970. Fischer would win tournament after tournament in dominant fashion. He won a blitz tournament with all the top player with a score of 19/22. Fischer would then go on and win an Interzonal with 18.5/23 losing only to Bent Larsen. -
5th Time's the Charm
After winning the Interzonal, Fischer competed in the 1971 Candidates matches. Due to Fischer complaining about match fixing. The tournament was held in matches rather than a round robin. Fischer would dominate this tournament. He beat Bent Larsen and Mark Taimonav by scores of 6-0 and 6-0. This was unheard of. He then went and beat former World Champion, Tigran Petrosian, by a score of 6.5 - 2.5. He had now finally qualified for the World Championship match vs Boris Spassky. -
It Begins
Fischer was 125 points above Spassky. In fact, Fischer had the highest difference between him and world no 2 in history. Fischer is often seen as the most dominant player of all time. However, he would lose the first game via a terrible blunder. In the second game, he would forfeit and complain to the arbiter about the cameras. Spassky could've claimed his victory in the match right there, but he opted to play on under Fischer's terms. Spassky was up 2-0 -
Comeback
Fischer would strike back to win game 3. By game 10 Fischer was leading 6.5 - 3.5 and he would finish leading 12.5 - 8.5 becoming the 12th World Champion -
World Championship Match
Boris Spassky was a Soviet and the USSR poured lots of money into Chess. Fischer was the lone American who did everything by himself, while Spassky had all the USSR's best grandmasters to help Spassky. This Chess match was the most-watched Chess match of all time. Since this was during the Cold War, many people thought it was very symbolic as Chess is a simulated war. -
And New!
Fischer would win the match against Spassky 12.5 - 8.5 becoming the 11th World Champion. -
Retirement
Fischer would stay inactive for 3 years. When Karpov won the Candidates and challenged him he gave 3 rules to FIDE. FIDE did not comply to all 3, so he retired and left. -
Fischer Random
Fischer was tired of Chess theory, the fact that the first 10 moves of any Chess game would be played out through memory. This led to him created Fischer Random, which was a variant where the pieces were placed on random squares at the beginning of the game. This is a very popular variant these days. -
911
Fischer would make his infamous comments about Americans being pigs and that the US deserved 911. -
Death
Bobby Fischer would die aged 64, the number of squares on a Chess board.