100 years of Mikhail Moiseyevich Botvinnik

The sixth World Champion
It's one hundred years since the birth of the sixth World Champion Mikhail Moiseyevich Botvinnik and Russian Federation is organizing a series of events to celeberate this fact. Botvinnik played a whole series of matches and tournaments for the tile and was World champion (with a couple of short breaks)from 1948 until 1963.

He first won the title in the Hague in 1948 when the world's leading players had a tournament to find a replacement for the deceased Alekhine. He later played closely-fought World Championship matches against Bronstein, Smyslov and Tal.

As he was close to the powers that be, he dominated Soviet chess thinking in the post-war era.

Despite his status as 'first amongst equals' in the chess world he wasn't even a professional! In fact he was an electrical engineer an earned a Phd in that domain. In later life he became interested in the technology behind creating a chess-playing computer.

He died in 1995.

I personally found his games collection to be very instructive and was one of my favourites in my youth. He explained his games with a logical-analytic style, with plenty of explanation. I preferred hisĀ approach to one involving detailed analysis, but little to explain the thoughts behind the variations.


Published on , Updated on

React to this article

Top of page ▲
All the members having a valid membership (out of trying period) can comment the articles. Let's subscribe !

Reactions (0)

  • No reaction for the moment