From America's Brightest Prodigy to the Edge of Madness

It was a pleasure to read this Fischer's biography. As a chess amateur, while studying the game I also liked to study the life to the greatest chess players from the past and Fischer had a strange resemblance with Jesus Christ life : No one seems to know a period of his life.

This book covers those "voided years" like when he stopped playing for near two years to return so strong that was well above any of his peers and also what happened to him after went into oblivion after achieving what he pursued his whole life: the world chess championship.

Do not get me wrong: it is not a book for chess players, it is a book for anyone who would like to know one of the most fascinating characters of the twentieth century and for those who would like to know also one of the most remarkable falls from the pinnacles of glory of one who could be.

Thanks a lot Frank Brady for this book.

This work fully captures Bobby Fischer as the complete Pride and Sorrow of Chess.
A young genius born to a peculiar age and set adrift without informed adult guidance that could connect with him. Working fanatically and setting his own course he meets with great success, immense confusion, and leads a mostly tragic life. He is a wonder you will recognize and a sadness that will be deeply felt.

As i've mentioned several times, there were two larger than life figures from my childhood, Evel Knievel and Bobby Fischer, men who performed these amazing feats in public and had such flawed private lives. Brady does a good job of recounting Fischer's missing "time" and the tragic ending of his life in exile. This is worth the money and time.

Very entertaining book which reviews the history of a person doomed to destroy himself. Fischer had no real life outside of chess and no relationships with people. As with other "celebrities", we make them feel as if they are exempt from the rules which govern the rest of society. They feel as if they are gods and can't deal with reality. We are a little responsible for what he became. Worth a reading.

Outstanding read. Great book, filled with the details of this wonderful human being. He fought the negatives of those who would try to control him and his talent. Those who are of the genius are usually denigrated by those of mediocre mind and talent. Loved this read! Jerry

Highly recommended for all readers.

This is a terrific bio of possibly the greatest chess player ever, Bobby Fischer. His remarkable, sad, and storied life is adeptly chronicled by author Brady. Engrossing from the first page to the very sad end.

The author could have paid much attention to the game. The story of Fischer out of the game is ok, but he was a genius, and as such, he wasn't a normal people.Here, in Brazil, during the militar govern we have something like fischer spitting the letter that he received from USA IRS. A singer with AIDS stepped on our symbol. Our militar govern did not pay attention to it, because he was severy ill. But the American govern acted differently. It was a pitty!!! So, why show a negative aspect of a genius? A loved one around the world? It should have shown his positive aspect, at least most of the time.

The author could have paid much attention to the game. The story of Fischer out of the game is ok, but he was a genius, and as such, he wasn't a normal people.Here, in Brazil, during the militar govern we have something like fischer spitting the letter that he received from USA IRS. A singer with AIDS stepped on our symbol. Our militar govern did not pay attention to it, because he was severy ill. But the American govern acted differently. It was a pitty!!! So, why show a negative aspect of a genius? A loved one around the world? It should have shown his positive aspect, at least most of the time.

Este párrafo introductorio del autor, que conocía de fondo al personaje, resume de gran manera la compleja vida de Fischer:

"Paradoxes abound. Bobby was secretive, yet candid; generous, yet parsimonious; naive, yet well informed; cruel, yet kind; religious, yet heretical. His games were filled with charm and beauty and significance. His outrageous pronouncements were filled with cruelty and prejudice and hate. And though for a period of decades he poured most of his energy and passion into a quest for chess excellence, he was not the idiot savant often portrayed by the press."

Un genio, que como la gran mayoría de ellos, dejó un gran legado - una obra de arte, en sus partidas- por el cual será permanentemente recordado, a pesar de sus actuaciones personales -de soledad, de rencor, de nomadismo, de antipatía- que le impidieron en sus años de vida tener el número de admiradores que se merecía.

Es una biografía sensible, escrita con un lenguaje muy descriptivo y poético en ocasiones, que narra imparcialmente, a pesar de la cercania de Brady a Bobby, los hechos que marcaron su vida.

Recomienda el escritor, que como homenaje final, vale la pena estudiar su gran legado, las partidas osadas y estructuradas que dejó. Eso haré, en los próximos días

I found the book Endgame describing Bobby Fischer's chess career quite interesting. Like ohter chess geniuses he learned the game as a child and had an astonishing talent for analysis and strategy. His ability to "see ahead several moves" seems to be a characteristic of all the great chess grandmasters.
It is truly sad and disappointing that Fishcer seemed to ahve a psychological quirk that augered against his best interests both professionally and socially.
E.J. Kelly
3/18/11

Wow - this biography of Bobby Fischer is fascinating. It dispels a lot of myth and gossip about him and gives a much more rounded picture of this complex person. Read this book to get the facts straight!

The strengths of the book lie in its narrative of Fischer's time outside the public limelight - both his early childhood and his later, post-championship years, plus interesting behind-the-scene stories. Oddly errors crop up during the retelling of Fischer's playing years, which are the best-documented periods of his career. For instance, after winning the right to play Spassky for the championship in 1971, Brady writes "Fischer would now be the first non-Soviet or non-Russian in more than three decades to play for the title against the reigning World Champion." Of course both Tal and Petrosian were non-Russians (Latvian and Armenian respectively). After beating Taimanov and Larsen by 6-0 each in the Candiates matches, Brady writes, "He'd now won an unprecedented nineteen straight games against the strongest players in the world." Obviously this streak includes the 12 Candidate match games and 7 in a row from the Mallorca Interzonal - but one of these was a game he won on forfeiture against Oscar Panno, which is not the impression you get from the Brady quote. There is no reason to "pad" Fischer's achievement by adding the 7 Interzonal wins, one of which was not a played game, to his already historic Candidates results. In a memorable scene from the 1959 Candidates, Fischer sees the movie Lust for Life about van Gogh and declares that he would cut off his ear too if he didn't beat Smyslov in the next game, which he does win. Brady then goes on to continue discussing the tournament and one is left with the impression that the important Smyslov win occurs somewhere mid-tournament. In fact it was the very last game of the tournament. Despite these annoying lapses (Brady should be claiming "j'adoube"), the book is nontheless both a fascinating account and enjoyable to read.

Fascinating biography of the chess genius whose life was riddled with championship at an early age as well as paranoia, reclusiveness and exile from his native land. Some glorious triumphs but, in the end, a pitiful existence.

Endgame: Bobby Fischer's Remarkable Rise and Fall - from America's Brightest Prodigy to the Edge of Madness

Lucidly written book, a must read for lovers of chess and BOBBY FISCHER. Objectively written book gives ones insight to this enigmatic chess player' thoughts and understanding to his absurd bizarre actions !!

Make a wonderful and interesting reading,

Frank Brady knew Bobby Fischer well and wrote the classic book Profile of a Prodigy soon after the 1972 World Championship win of Fischer's. That book is a very good look at Fischer's life to that point but the author needed to be careful of what he wrote as Fischer may have disowned him if he disliked parts of the book unflattering to him..

In Endgame, the author is able to give the whole truth about Fischer (as he sees it).

Fischer's life after 1972 was one of discovery. On the run to the title, he was totally devoted to chess but afterwards he was able to start looking at other aspects of life through reading hundreds and hundreds of books. This knowledge pursuit fit very well into Fischer's personality as it required isolation and time. Perhaps the reading material instilled certain beliefs in him that negatively affected him in later life but maybe the beliefs were always there just waiting to be expressed.

The book deals with Fischer from a child up until his passing, and is really a good look at the man after the title, that is the most important point of a biography (as opposed to a chess biography which can be chess only) seeing what the subject is like after they have attained their ultimate goal.

Post 1972 in Fischer's life is important as it saw him retreat from active competition while Champion, refuse the $5 Million match with Karpov in 1975 and go into a virtual hibernation in California. His comeback for the 1992 match with Spassky is covered well and we get to see the changed Fischer from 1972.

Post 1992 is the decline of the man as his words and actions had created ramifications with the Government and increased Fischer's own healthy paranoia.

This is a far better written book than Profile of a Prodigy, mainly due to the maturation of the author's writing style and the ability to write without fear of Fischer's opinions. I enjoyed it immensely from the viewpoint of a chess fan and a fan of biographies. The author tends to be even handed throughout and reveals some interesting aspects of Fischer's life.

The author of "Endgame," Frank Brady, does something almost beyond belief in a mere 330 pages.

He more or less figures out Bobby Fischer.

This is something along the lines of checkmating a grandmaster in about 15 minutes. Fischer certainly ranks as the most controversial chess champion in history -- he really doesn't have a great deal of competition -- and sorting out his life story must have been a difficult task.

Luckily for us, Brady is more than up to it. The pages crackle with good research, and the author brings the dual skill of a knowledge of chess and the experience of an author who has done books on other subjects.

Brady takes back to Fischer's early days in New York, when he was never sure who his father might have been and his mother was out protesting or studying something or other. As a result, this bright kid was essentially a latchkey child before the term was popular. He needed an outlet, and somehow chess fit it.

Before long, Fischer was the greatest child prodigy in the history of the game. He was given memberships to New York chess clubs, and sponsored as he worked his way up the chess rankings in record time. At the age of 13, Fischer defeated Donald Byrne with a strategy that was so brilliant that the contest was almost instantly called "The Game of the Century." Let's repeat that -- Fischer was 13.

By the time he was 16, Fischer was ready to quit school to study chess full-time, even though one of his high school classmates had a crush on him. Her name: Barbra Streisand. (Kudos to Brady for getting that quote from her in the story.) Fischer ran off some American titles but couldn't quite get to world champion's status, in part because he kept inventing problems that got in the way. Fischer started to develop a mistrust and eventual hatred for the Soviets back then, which cost him opportunities.

Fischer finally did meet Boris Spassky in a championship match in 1972, and after making everyone jump through hoops in negotiations did manage to win the title handily. But he forfeited the crown three years later when he wouldn't agree to the terms of a rematch, and his behavior spiraled down from there. Fischer soon added the American government and Jews to his enemies list (odd for someone whose parents probably were both Jewish), and his list of friends soon dwindled to those who admired his play enough to tolerate his boorish behavior.

Fischer received some notoriety in 2001 for a radio broadcast in which he applauded the 9/11 attacks on the United States. He wasn't popular with the U.S. government for violating sanctions and playing a chess match in Serbia several years before that. By the end of the story, he was an exile in Iceland, a man who had taken the fillings out of his teeth for alleged medical reasons and who was finding real or imagined slights to anger anyone he touched.

What's great about all this is that Brady merely sticks to the facts without much editorializing. And those facts are quite damning enough. The author even fills in some details of the lost years, when Fischer simply disappeared from public view. The picture is of someone whose genius enraptured many who came in contact with him, and they were a little too willing to excuse his behavior. Fischer is clearly someone with major issues, starting as a teen and having them blossom to extreme levels over the years.

Fischer will always fascinate the chess-playing audience, in part because he's the greatest mind ever to become a major part of the game's history. Brady describes a scene in a restaurant in which he asks Fischer how he prepares for a game. Fischer pulled out a small chess board, and reviewed a long series of moves from dozens of games at rapid-fire succession. By the time Fischer was done, Brady said he shed tears because he knew he was in the presence of genius.

But chess isn't the only attraction here. The Bobby Fischer in this book is many-sided -- dedicated to the game, capable of seeing what few others could on the chessboard, probably incapable of displaying much affection, filled with so many demons that by the end it's hard to believe he could get out of bed.

Even someone who doesn't know a rook from a pawn will find much worthwhile about "Endgame." I can't imagine a stranger American life, or a better literary treatment of it.

Mr. Brady is a chess player who knew Fischer. While that does not give him a lot of first hand information to put into a biography, it does give him the perspective necessary to write a fair and incisive account of his life. Brady is very good at evaluating the available evidence and making reasonable inferences without speculating.

He does not presume any sophisticated knowledge of chess and discusses the game at the most general level. But the reader is able to appreciate Fischer's creativity and his willingness to take the risks necessary if one is to prevail against other grand masters -- and if one is to extricate oneself from a difficult situation created by such risk taking gone bad. In this respect, the book is particularly excellent for those who know nothing about the game.

Boris Spassky, whom Fischer defeated in 1972 to win the championship, emerges from this book as a far better man than Fischer -- a truly admirable gentleman. But one doesn't hate Fischer after reading this book, though his diva tendencies, narcissism, and spoiled brat routine does leave the reader cold. Rather, Fischer was a tragic person, whose loneliness and paranoia and anxieties got the better of him.

At the end of his life, he attempted to apply his genius and voracious reading and intellectual abilities that made him a great chess player to politics and history. However, he lacked the perspective and judgment to digest this material properly, and ended up falling for some crackpot antisemitic tracts. I wouldn't say that he was an idiot savant who excelled at chess, but, rather, that a man needs judgment, perspective, and emotional intelligence to succeed in life in the most general sense. Fischer was a lonely and sad man plagued by his emotional demons.

This is an excellent book.

Frank Brady, author of PROFILE OF A PRODIGY, one of the best books on the rise of Bobby Fischer to the World Chess Championship in 1972, is "back at the board" with a full-length general-reader biography that completes Fischer's bizarre odyssey to (and beyond?) "the edge of madness" and the man's pathetic end as a stateless, anti-Semitic quasi-hermit in Iceland, the site of his great victory. Brady certainly knows as much about this strange genius as anyone, and he does deliver a readable book, but the end product is not what it could have been, thanks in large part to Brady's patchy (to put it mildly) and occasionally cynical (to put it harshly) use of material from PRODIGY. A "newbie" unfamiliar with chess literature will no doubt have a more positive opinion of the work.

To give him his due, Brady does expand upon some events that were only touched upon in the earlier book. He gives a good description of Bobby's childhood and fleshes out such incidents as young Bobby's appearance on "I've Got a Secret" in the late 1950s, but skims over some others that would appear to be particularly germane to the theme of Fischer the tortured genius. Why not more on Ralph Ginzburg's ATLANTIC MONTHLY interview with Fischer from 1961, a piece which did considerable damage to Fischer's reputation very early in his career? Brady describes the Fischer who appeared in that portrait as "homophobic" and "misogynistic" but doesn't give us any particulars. When the subject turns to Fischer's amazing run through the qualifying rounds prior to his 1972 duel with Boris Spassky, Brady suddenly "becomes a camera," reproducing entire passages from PROFILE verbatim. Other writers have been able to dig up much more information on the Fischer-Spassky match (especially now that the old Soviet archives have been opened) and produce highly enjoyable works. The fact that Brady did not avail himself of these new data was highly disappointing.

Fischer's post-1972 life makes profoundly depressing reading, and Brady's book is at its most interesting (in a perverse sort of way) here. While he had a certain ability to charm people, Fischer's devouring need to control all aspects of his environment ultimately drove all but the most loyal of his compatriots away. His late-in-life anti-Americanism (e.g. his notorious cheering for "death to America" after 9/11) is attributed in part to a late detonation of warnings about "FBI snooping" passed on by Fischer's leftist mother, but the cynic in me is more inclined to blame his legal quarrels over money and unwillingness to pay taxes. (This is, after all, a man who wanted to be paid more for a chess championship defense than Muhammad Ali and George Foreman got for their "Rumble in the Jungle.") There is something touching in Fischer's desire to find romantic love as he aged, but in all other respects he is a particularly noxious example of how genius can destroy itself from within. I certainly think that there will be better Fischer biographies in the future, but this is a good "first draft" of Fischer's twisted history.

Endgame:

Bobby Fischer’s Remarkable Rise and Fall

by Frank Brady

In 1943 a genius was born. That genius had a gift for playing the game of chess, genius that showed itself at a very young age. He became obsessed with the game, studied it endlessly to the exclusion of everything else. By 16, he was a high school dropout, and a chess grandmaster. He was already well on his way to becoming the world chess champion.

At 29, Bobby Fischer played the championship game against Russia’s Boris Spassky as the whole world watched. Even people the world over with no interest in chess followed the competition. The meeting of the two leading world powers (United States and Russia), then in the heat of the intense Cold War, came together over a chess board. It was Bobby Fischer’s greatest moment.

Endgame by Frank Brady examines Bobby Fischer’s rise to greatness. His childhood is chronicled, his rise to worldwide fame explored, and ultimately his madness which escalated and intensified with each passing year was described and documented. As chess became less a part of his life, his attention focused instead on hate. He became a vicious and vile person. Venom poured from his lips, his hatred resounding across worldwide radio broadcasts targeting primarily Jews and America/Americans. His hate list also included Russia, Japan, the Union Bank of Switzerland, most chess grandmasters he had met and often befriended but eventually loathed, any and all medical treatments, noise, and so much more. Eventually he even added Iceland and all Icelanders to his hate list and felt no obligation for their courtesies and royal treatment of him. Yet somehow, inexplicably and contrary to my feelings about this loathsome madman, I was moved by his death.

Readers do not have to know how to move a pawn or a knight, or even what pieces are played in the game of chess. This fascinating book is written for a broad audience, and is written well.

Biographer Frank Brady (born 1934) is Chairman of the Department of Mass Communications, Journalism, Television and Film at St. John's University; he has been an editor of "Chess Life," and Chessworld," directed many major chess tournaments, and was even an editor for Ralph Ginzburg and Hugh Hefner. He has written a number of books, such as Bobby Fischer: Profile of a Prodigy (Revised Edition) (Dover Chess),Onassis: An Extravagant Life,Hefner, etc.

He said in the "Author's Note" to this 2011 book, "As someone who knew Bobby Fischer from the time he was quite young, I've been asked hundreds of times, 'What was Bobby Fischer really like?' This book is an attempt to answer that question... Paradoxes abound. Bobby was secretive, yet candid... naive, yet well informed... religious, yet heretical... he was not the idiot savant often portrayed by the press... I ask forgiveness for my occasional speculations in this book, but Fischer's motivations beg to be understood... I want readers ... to feel as though they're sitting next to Bobby, on HIS side of the chessboard, or in the privacy of his home." (Pg. ix-x)

He observes that "From a very early age he followed his own rhythms... An intense stubbornness seemed to be his distinguishing feature." (Pg. 13) He notes, "Fischer, who much later in life would gain notoriety for his anti-Jewish rhetoric, always said that although his mother was Jewish, he had no religious training. It is not known whether Bobby... participated in the formal Jewish ritual of Bar Mitzvah." (Pg. 53)

He recounts that Fischer began listening to Herbert Armstrong's radio and then television program, and ultimately became closely associated with Armstrong's Worldwide Church of God: "He refused to enter tournaments whose organizers insisted he play on Friday might, and he began a life of devotion to the Church's tenets." (Pg. 120-121) He adds, "he began to face a time conflict between his two commitments: religion and chess... [Yet] Forty years later he'd still be espousing ideas put forth by Armstrong and [Armstrong's magazine] the 'Plain Truth.'" (Pg. 143) Still, "His connection to the Church was always somewhat ambiguous. He was not a registered member, since he hadn't agreed to be baptized by full immersion in water by Armstrong or one of his ministers... The Church imposed a number of rules that Bobby thought were ridiculous and refused to adhere to, such as a ban on listening to hard rock or soul music... despite Bobby's unwillingness to follow principles espoused by the Church, his life still revolved around it... he enjoyed perks only available to high-ranking members." (Pg. 210)

When his participation in the champion chess match with Boris Spassky was in jeopardy, Fischer received a 10-minute phone call from Henry Kissinger, then-National Security Adviser; "It was at this point that Bobby saw himself not just as a chess player, but as a Cold War warrior in defense of his country." (Pg. 184) Although he eventually lost his 1972 title due to his failure to defend it, he still described himself as "The World's Chess Champion." Brady notes, "Bobby explained to a friend that he had never been defeated... he believed the true World's Champion title was still rightfully his." (Pg. 228)

After his victory in 1972, he began reading anti-Semitic writings; "Bobby's evolving credo was not only anti-Semitic, but as he fell away from the Worldwide Church of God, completely anti-Christian. He discredited both the Old and New Testaments of the Bible, the very book that had been so much a part of his belief system." (Pg. 212-213) After the terrorist attacks on 9/11, he made some incredible comments in a radio broadcast, such as that "I applaud the act [i.e., the terrorist attacks]... I want to see the U.S. wiped out..." (Pg. 277-278)

Brady's book is a very honest, sympathetic, and insightful portrait of this genius whom many of us idolized in 1972, yet whose subsequent behavior puzzled and sometimes outraged us.

This was a great book about Bobby Fischer, and tells the story of how he became obsessed by many things that turned him from his victorious position in chess to being a paranoid delusional outcast and fugitive. I'm doing this review a little differently, dividing it up with a few important quotes from the book.

"Ultimately, he rejected all games of chance." -- pg 10.

In the beginning, when he was only a child (6-8 years old), he realized that many board games relied heavily on chance, like using dice, and his skill had nothing to do with the outcome. This was one of the reasons he was attracted to chess. I can identify with this part of him, as that is exactly why I have always felt lukewarm about games such as Monopoly, but was immediately intrigued by chess. I have nowhere near the chess ability, but I can at least identify with the sentiment.

"I began to weep quietly, aware that in that time-suspended moment I was in the presence of genius." -- pg 129, author

When the author was sitting with him in a restaurant, and Fischer was going over something on his miniature, portable chess set, analyzing a game and possible moves, he was so absorbed in the analysis that the author realized just how deep his chess genius went. Fischer was completely absorbed by chess, and almost nothing else until he achieved the world championship at 29 years of age.

"Fischer is a man of art, but he is a rare human being in the everyday life of this century. I like Fischer and I think I understand him." -- Spassky, pg 203

Spoken just after the world championship, in which Fischer won against Boris Spassky. Though he virtually destroyed Spassky's career permanently, he actually felt sorry for him, during and after the game. Fischer did display some generosity towards Spassky, writing him a friendly letter and giving him a "gift-wrapped camera as a token of
friendship."

"I am bored and disgusted with him...they make so much out of a goof like him." -- Jack Collins, pg 249

This quote from one of Fischer's primary friends and mentors came during the time when Fischer was to come out of a twenty year hiatus of financial ruin (more on that later) to play Spassky again in war-torn Yugoslavia, a game financed by a criminal, played in a location forbidden by U.S. economic sanctions. Some of the interviews with Fischer displayed his antisemitism and anti-U.S. sentiment. Two of the redeeming features of this section is that he was able to bring himself out of poverty, and he brought Spassky out of obscurity.

"Fischer came close to being a moron." -- Martin Gardner, pg 297

It is amazing that he had millions of dollars practically thrown at him that he refused, and all because he didn't want anyone else to make money in the process. Anyone should realize that if you win the world championship, and all these companies are throwing millions at you, their plan is to make money in the process, not to just donate to your personal wealth out of the goodness of their heart.

Sure, maybe much of that was simple greed, because he wanted all the benefits of his own accomplishments, and his own name, and begrudged any benefits that anyone else may have reaped from those things, but when it comes down to it, he brought himself to penury by his religiousness (tithing to a cult), and by his greed.

When playing in a tournament, he was so demanding, that he lost the chance to play on many occasions, even putting himself out of the World Championship games after his first time (in which he almost didn't get to play because of his tantrums), so that Karpov was able to be champion in 1975 without even playing Fischer.

Yes, I realize Fischer was a genius, and a chess prodigy, but for someone with so much potential to sabotage themselves the way he did, even though the whole world was at his feet, willing to give him anything, is just sad. For that reason, though this book is impeccably researched and written, it is depressing to read about the life of someone that literally had it all, and threw it all away. There are lessons to be learned by reading this work.

I guess my point is that he should have made the best of it and took the money. He should have kept playing and stayed World Champion for decades. As a possible role model, with enough intelligence, wealth and fame...he could have had a positive effect for many purposes. He could have promoted chess more, promoted accomplishment, and even promoted removal of lead from toys if he thought that was a good cause. With an IQ of 181, I would submit that his intelligence and talent were wasted by bad decisions. You would have to read the book to understand what I'm talking about. He rejected all things that were good for him, including medical care, which was why he died early. Very simply, he was self destructive.

For any chess enthusiast or admirer of superlative achievement this book represents an enthralling masterpiece that is difficult to put down. Yet Frank Brady has captured much more than just interest. With his personable approach and comprehensive knowledge of Fischer's life, Brady provides considerable insight in a presentation so welcoming it is as if you are listening to Fischer's story over a cup of coffee.

Bobby Fischer's life has always been full of intrigue. From prodigy to world champion, genius to near lunacy, no one will ever know what really went on inside the Fischer's head. Brady has enough personal material to give clues to some of the more thought provoking questions. Was Fischer pure genius or was his unyielding passion and ability to stay so focused his real brilliance? Did Fischer's mind erode into psychosis or did the series of events that made up his unique life result in an ironic inability to assess the quality of his own influences? Brady examines Fischer's life in such depth that whatever your view you will find more than enough material to think deeply about answers to such questions.

Perhaps most significant is Brady's ability to capture the real essence and magnitude of Fischer's accomplishments. This is not merely a story of struggle and success. Fischer did not just rise to the top like any other world chess champion. As a child Fischer had the full force of the Soviet Union against him with little support from the US, often only finding assistance from those whose involvement had more to do with their own interests instead of Fischer's. Having no father figure and little understanding of the world, it is mind boggling that Fischer as a child was able to handle each day let alone competing at the peak of ability. Who among us could have withstood even a fraction of such pressures as children, yet Fischer took on the world and won.

Brady objectively illustrates the grandiose elements of Fischer's life while delectably handling his eventual downfall. Fischer's life is exceptionally fascinating on its own, and Brady's handling of his story only adds to the intrigue. If you have even a mild interest in chess or perhaps just enjoy a fine biography, this book is a must.

Genius and madness are more often associated with each other than what popular culture, particularly films involving mad scientists, lets on. Bobby Fischer was both a genius and a mentally conflicted person bordering if not crossing over into madness. There is no doubt how brilliant and bizarre the gentlemen was after his rise to fame at the young age of 13. Indeed, his legacy goes far beyond his politics as my older brother began studying chess and hardcore math around the same age to emulate the boy genius and later became a defense software engineer for the US Air Force.

As for me, I studied history and felt perfectly content to suck at both chess and math and read about the walking chess machine in Frank Brady's rightfully critically acclaimed book "Endgame." This is a book literally decades in the making as Brady literally followed Fischer at a young age culminating in the book Endgame. I must admit, I was pleasantly surprised at how well it was written given how narratives can be extremely boring if not done correctly.

Brady certainly does not hold back in the details about Fischer as I learned a great deal more about the individual than I did hearing snippets on the nightly news about his recent... ramblings. The details were placed in decent chronological order and easy to read without going off into mundane, unnecessary details (The Tom Clancy Effect).

All in all, a good read for anyone needing an enjoyable read.

This biography provided a lot of insight into the life and mind of Bobby Fischer. As a young boy, Fischer was often left alone by his mother while she pursued her medical studies. Mentored by two chess masters (first, Carmine Nigro and later Jack Collins), Bobby developed his skills and chess strategies and learned how to play fast and in a variety of settings.

"When seven-year-old Bobby, accompanied by his mother walked into the Brooklyn Chess Club for the first time on a Friday night in January 1951, he was an anomaly. He was, in fact the first child permitted to enter. Even the appearance of Regina Fischer was unusual: There were no other women present, and at that time there were no female members on the club's roster, as was the case at many other clubs in the United States" p. 19.

One of the best things about Brady's crafting of Bobby's story is that he always gives readers a context, pulling in relevant current events and the social (and world) political climate of the 1950s through 2008 when Bobby died in Iceland.

Because of Bobby Fischer and the world press coverage he received, chess became wildly popular in the United States in the 60s and 70s. I'm sure I can thank Bobby Fischer for that fact that we had a chess set at our house when I was growing up, and that I learned to play. I did not, however, devote the ten thousand hours of practice to the game that Bobby did, in order for him to become world chess champion.

"Malcolm Gladwell in his book 'Outliers' describes how people in all fields reach success...To become a chess grandmaster seems to take about ten years. (Only the legendary Bobby Fischer got to that elite level in less than that amount of time: it took him nine years) p. 140."

What comes through in this well-written biography is that Bobby had the opportunity, discipline, interest and great mentors. He also had an analytical mind.

If you've never read anything about Fischer before, this biography is likely the best book to read. It chronicles the life of the chess genius Bobby Fischer from the time he's born until his death. The book really starts with background on his mother prior to Bobby's birth setting up her unique "personality" and subsequently using this profile as a primary influence on Fischer's development as a child.

The events leading to his World Championship victory in 1972 (29 years old) take up about 200 of the 300 pages of the book. So, if the book were strictly dealing with the "Endgame" (his life from 29 to his age at death 64), the book would have been 100 pages long. Not really all that impressive in terms of thirty five years of his adult life. Granted, in these thirty five years, he only played a handful of chess games and demonstrated on a regular basis that he had completely fallen off the edge of sanity, maybe it's not bad. But there were far too many questions left unanswered for those that had read about Fischer before (namely me), as well as unexplained gaps even in the material that the book addressed. The difference in this book is that the author attempted to provide information on Fischer's life prior to his winning the championship that explained his mental collapse.

The book got three stars for some very specific reasons ... here are the most important.

First, the author could not keep his objectivity in regard to Fischer. He knew Fischer and it was clear that he was highly sympathetic. It certainly skewed his perspective so much that at times in the book, it was really hard to separate fact from the author's assertions on Bobby's thoughts, feelings etc.. The attempts to humanize Bobby and perhaps extract some sympathy from the reader really left me wondering how much of the book was based on second, third, or fourth hand information. It starts as early as the first few pages where the author jumps to the account of Fischer's arrest at the Japanese airport, where the whole passage reads like someone is writing a character in a novel instead of providing third person objective accounts.

Second, Fischer was simply way past the edge of sanity. The book subtitle says "... to the Edge of Madness", but everything written about Fischer in this and other books clearly demonstrates that Fischer was not mentally sane. The author dabbled in theories indirectly by providing certain facts that would lead to his complicated psychosis, such as his mother's involvements with the Jewish intellectual community in Brooklyn during Bobby's childhood. The implication is that Fischer resented the involvement of his mother with the Jewish community when she should have been spending it with him and that lead to later hatred of Jews. Perhaps this is true, but this observation really did not amount to anything more than just a passing theory and really almost bordered on speculation and conjecture. In any case, most of the stories about Fischer and his erratic behavior are well documented and this book did little to add to those already addressed in other books such as The Wandering King or even the many articles and reports written about Fischer since his mental collapse starting really from his teenage years.

Third, Brady didn't seem to want to answer any of the previously unanswered questions, such as "who was Fischer's real father?". The book really just restates everything already written. I don't know if it was up to Brady to do independent research on this, but certainly he might have attempted to interview people that might have known. I also believe that some facts were taken as facts without really processing them with scrutiny. He cited certain people as "good friends" and provided one instance of them being together. This sounds like the author interviewed that person, the person in question said that they were good friends,provided a reason, and then it was presented as a fact in Brady's book. My own belief is that Fischer trusted no one but possibly his sister and mother. He certainly used people without regard for them as human beings. Everyone was placed on the earth to service his wants and needs. Any divergence from this for Fischer was betrayal.

All in all, anyone who has read two, three or more works on Fischer's life probably will find this book interesting, but still not providing the definitive work on Fischer. Although this is the best attempt at a biography, I personally found much of it redundant with other works and not really what I'd hoped for in the "last" book about Fischer. But in many ways, I'm probably like most people that don't need to know much more about his hatred and bigotry. There are some things that are clear, the Soviets did conspire against him when it came to chess. If you're interested in this, read the book "Russians Vs Fischer" published by Everyman Chess.

Other books on Fischer that might be of interest ...

Bobby Fischer: The Wandering King - This book addresses Fischer's life after the World Championship but does not include his life in Iceland (it was completed before he died). In actuality, Brady's book has only a handful of pages on this and profiles a similar Fischer (ungrateful and self-destructive).

Russians Versus Fischer - This book provides excerpts from KGB files, interview with players, and a chronicle of the evidence that the
Soviets did have mandates from the government and KGB to maximize Soviet chances of success. A good reference book, but difficult to read from cover to cover. Also, after you've read this book, you do question Brady's interpretation of the behavior of individual Soviet players. Some really had little choice but to do what they were told with the consequences quite high if they didn't. Some were worse than others using the system to climb to the top.

Bobby Fischer Goes to War - This book focuses on the World Championship Match and the underhanded behavior of the Soviets. A bit of a tough read with its own problems, but definitely one more perspective.

Of course there are many other books and sources of information, but the story never changes, Fischer was one of the most self-destructing figures in American history do to his mental collapse and inability to treat others in anything but a subservient way. His remarks later in life are either sad, pathetic, and inexcusable. Brady tries to make excuses, but Fischer certainly was his own worst enemy. One thing that is hard to argue, he was one of the best chess players ever to live. His games prove that.

In summary, the book did provide some new stories about Fischer that I found interesting and as a whole, it was worth reading. But the book did have some fairly large problems that really kept it from the quality consistent with those writers that are professional biographers. If you only read one book about Fischer, this is probably your best choice and like many others, you might just give it five stars.

_Endgame: Bobby Fischer's Remarkable Rise and Fall - from America's Brightest Prodigy to the Edge of Madness_ (2001) by Frank Brady is an interesting biography of one of America's and the world's greatest chess prodigies, Bobby Fischer, that chronicles his rise to fame and winning of the World Championship and then his decline into near madness. The book provides a detailed account of the life of Fischer and explains his upbringing and his early involvement in chess. The book considers Fischer's confrontations with the Russians and in particular with Boris Spassky and the Cold War implications of these chess matches. The book also examines the personal life of Fischer and his involvement with religion in the Worldwide Church of God and his eventual disillusionment with this organization. Finally, the book shows Fischer's descent into what some believe was madness and his rabid anti-Semitic, pro-Nazi, and anti-American tirades. This book both examines the life of Fischer and provides a detailed study of his highly gifted but severely troubled personality.

Sad story about chess champion Bobby Fischer's life, from becoming a chess champion in his teens, his family life, his enthusiasm & being self-driven that turns into obsession and to an altered personality from being in the spotlight, not that dissimilar to young people that get caught up in it now, yet from a different time.

I found the writing to be tough to go from use of unnecessarily complex wording to an extremely simplistic description of chess a child could understand. I didn't care for the writing style, as it seemed as "Deeply troubled", as I vaguely recall hearing about him on TV when I was younger.

The author outlines his life from being different, or eccentric to extremely demanding over even what most people in the spotlight at the time would consider 'trivial' things, to alienating behaviors, to "the edge of madness" as the author's title puts it. He seemed to hate himself and his heritage & made many antisemitic comments himself, even though he was Jewish himself.

I took away from it that he seemed to be more of a savant than a functional person, that at times the press "misinterpreted" things he said, in attempts to get a reaction from a man who it seems just wanted to be left alone . Many of us have heard the story that he had his teeth fillings removed because, according to the news, he thought the CIA, KGB or whoever might be able to get at him through that, when according to the author, he had concerns about the metals used in amalgum, a problem that is becoming more of a reality, yet today we have other types of fillings that were scarce in those days. He seemed to be aware at some level, even at that point, that his health wasn't right. His kidney disease later in life, as well as his environment when he was young, and perhaps undiagnosed health problems, as well as his, as the author puts it, he spent a lot of time reading hateful publications, which seemed to alter his sense of reality and had much to do with his lashing out at others and himself at the same time as his presence grew in the spotlight, and became his undoing.

He was Jewish himself, yet an anti-semite, he's stated to have said he hated America, as he felt it was an illegal state stolen from the American Indians.

The book uses the word "hate" more times that I could count & honestly, I didn't ever reach the end of the book. It seemed to be somewhat fabricated, yet somewhat true. We'll never really know. After reading as much as I did, I found it a rather depressing story about a man that could have had what he wanted & chose to use it as a platform for hatred, and that he seemed to be a miserable person that was very uncomfortable with our even hated himself.

He was a tortured, paranoid recluse after a while. Facing a massive fine & a 10-year prison sentence as a fugitive, he ranted & raved about the US, Jews & talked of "executing Jews in the US".

In some ways he was very intelligent, but hateful - not only of others, but of his own heritage. He lost who he was & sadly lost his grip on reality.

A somewhat mildly interesting, seemingly at least in part fabricated for sales, insight to a genius, without a well-rounded life & who was a very angry person with some terrible influences in life.

If you want to know about Bobby Fischer's life, really up to the 1970's, this might be for you. If you're really interested in what he really had to say, there is enough media coverage out there of him to find out what he was about, at least outwardly. If you want to know about chess, this isn't about chess, unless you want a little insight on the chess tournaments he played in.

Wasn't for me. I don't care to read about someone so talented in some things, yet loosing his mind & spewing hate in others. Frankly a pretty depressing story. I would have given it 1 star, but there's already enough hate in this man's story that it didn't need any more.

Author Frank Brady first met Bobby Fischer when Fischer was just 10 years old, and remained a personal friend until Fischer's death in 2008. The reader would be reasonable in assuming this relationship would shed light on aspects of Fischer's life not previously known. But before making that assumption, there is a catch, one overlooked in most reviews of this book: this is Brady's second biography of Fischer. The first, Bobby Fischer: Profile of a Prodigy (Revised Edition), first published in 1965 and subsequently revised several times, covers much of the same ground, and is referenced a remarkable 43 times in Wikipedia's Bobby Fischer page.

Of course much happened in Fischer's life after 1988, and this offering, Endgame: Bobby Fischer's Remarkable Rise and Fall - from America's Brightest Prodigy to the Edge of Madness, meticulously recounts Fischer's final years. In 1992, after being deported from the United States, and after allegedly being beaten and jailed by the Japanese government, Fischer embarked on a global trek in search of a home ... a Meyer Lansky-like Man-Without-a-Country searching for a place to call home.. He finally settled in Iceland, where he lived out his final years, and where his celebrated life was capped by an ignominious burial attended by just seven mourners.

Unlike his first biography, Brady includes none of the many chess diagrams and game strategies, ostensibly to draw on his own personal experiences to shed light on Fischer's personality. But little of Brady himself is evident in this book, as he seems to intentionally remove himself and his experiences from the text. The result is a bit of a dry read, though factually detailed and fascinating in its recounting of Fischer's many peculiarities. In a February 2011 interview, Brady focused on what he believes was Fischer's most self-destructive weakness: Certainty. Brady believes the universal acknowledgment of Fischer's genius as a chess champion seduced him into a Certainty that his genius applied to all aspects of life. This weakness, coupled with an apparent propensity for provocative public statements - including praise for the 9/11 terrorist attacks (he called them "a good thing)," and outspoken anti-semitism, (beliefs he held despite his own Jewish heritage) - left him a much-reviled, marginal figure. Despite these weaknesses, this book recounts how Fischer's final words left us a final contradiction: "Nothing soothes like a human touch."

Previous knowledge of chess or its masters isn't necessary to an appreciation of Bobby Fischer's story or this latest work by Frank Brady. The book is an engrossing read - well researched and full of drama. It's the story of a child prodigy, his obsessive love for the game, his foray into chess at the time that the Russians and Eastern Europeans dominated chess, and his impressive

Endgame opens with Fischer's arrest in Japan for traveling on an expired passport. His fear, confusion, and the strangeness of the scene alerts to the drama that unfolds. This glimpse into Fischer's decline is juxtaposed against Fischer's childhood and his love of chess.

Fischer and his elder sister were raised by their mother on a very tight budget. Brady met Fischer in these early years and is well acquainted with the generous New Yorkers that served as teachers and mentors and extended family to young Bobby Fischer. Brady captures what Fischer was like - brilliant, easily bored, and deeply fascinated by chess. His sister bought a chess set when he was six years old. His sister and mother weren't as interested in the game, he beat them, and played against himself often and constantly. As his obsessive love for chess overtook his other interests, his mother grew worried enough to try to get him to seek therapy or reduce his obsession. While she worried about the intensity of his obsession with chess, his mother introduced him to chess masters, teachers, and groups. Fischer's skill and grasp of the game stood out early on. I particularly enjoyed reading about Fischer's early years - the people that took an interest in him, introduced him to other talented players, discussed the nuances of the game, brought him to tournaments, welcomed him into their exclusive clubs. Brady shares small details that give a clear picture of Bobby Fischer both at an early age and as his career quickly blossoms.

As we read about each of Fischer's matches and how each of them impacted his skill and career, we learn about sports competitions during the Cold War. Chess was dominated by the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, their champions were cared for, trained supported and received significant backing from their governments. Fischer was bitter - perhaps rightfully so - about the extent to which the Russian players were supported and worked together. His brilliance, youth, abrasiveness, and confrontational attitude stood out in these competitions. In his later years, Fischer became known for his membership in fringe religious groups, anti-semitic tirades, and reclusive behavior.

Our fascination with Bobby Fischer is reflected in movies such as Searching for Bobby Fischer and a new HBO documentary Bobby Fischer Against the World. Endgame: Bobby Fischer's Remarkable Rise and Fall - from America's Brightest Prodigy to the Edge of Madness is a fascinating and well researched account of Bobby Fischer's life.

ISBN-10: 9780307463906 - Hardcover
Publisher: Crown (February 1, 2011), 416 pages.
Review copy provided by the publisher.

Endgame is a biography of chess prodigy Bobby Fischer, and it's perfect if you want to learn about the man from an author who doesn't have an agenda. It's objectively told and a very compelling read. Even if you don't know much about Bobby Fischer or the chess world, Brady makes the material very accessible and interesting.

Brady does an excellent job filling in the gaps among the headline-making stories of Fischer's life. Readers can try to understand Fischer's decline, how he went from a world chess champion to a person fueled by paranoia with no desire to take care of himself. It's clear that Brady did his research, and he shows the reader a fascinating, incredibly self-absorbed man whose demons got the better of him.

Frank Brady provides a fascinating account of Fischer's brilliant and lonely life, giving good insight into what drove the man. Bobby Fischer was a child prodigy who never knew his real father, a renowned physicist. As a child, he could mentally visualize a chess board well enough to play entire games in his head, but he was happiest retreating into his room to hone his chess skills or listen to the disembodied voice of a radio.

Developing frighteningly powerful chess skills, his one goal became winning the world championship. He accomplished that in the most celebrated and widely followed chess match ever, in Iceland in 1972, against Boris Spassky. In one fell swoop, he had wrestled the chess throne away from the Russians, and created an explosion of interest in chess in the United States.

Then, he virtually walked away from the game, pre-occupying himself with an evangelical form of Christianity he had found in radio broadcasts, and gradually becoming infected with a paranoid, self-hating form of anti-Semitism. He denounced his homeland, and became a man without a country, living with the help of patrons in the world chess community. He lapsed into a monastic existence, continuing to pursue knowledge but becoming ever more erratic in his worldview, until he died in Iceland--- a tragic end for a man who had provided the world with some of the most beautiful chess games ever witnessed.

This is definitely one of the most detailed biography's I've ever read. If you're looking for something that just zeros in on the sensational, this is not the book for you. This is a book about a the fascinating life of one of the best chess players to ever play the game. It's about what happens when a child grows up on poverty and the scars it can leave him with that translate into obsessive behavior that is channeled into the obsessive game of chess.

I was amazed at how many books Fischer read on the game of chess while growing up. How he immersed himself in the game with a single-mindedness that few people have. I felt for his mother who tried to get him to into other things such as sports, and his school work, but Bobby only wanted to play chess. Of course there were signs of autism in Bobby's behavior, could that have been what made him great at chess? So many questions and the author doesn't spoon feed us any easy answers.

Perhaps it takes a certain kind of mind to master such an intricate game, and perhaps if Bobby Fischer would have become obsessed about something else we'd have seen a different kind of person emerge. Or maybe if Bobby would have had a father around to love and protect him he wouldn't have needed to become so obsessed with a game that is basically war disguised as a polite game.

Who can say, but what Frank Brady gives us with is the facts of Bobby Fischer as he knows them, and Brady did know Fischer so he writes from personal observation. With enough facts at our disposal without too much conjecture, we can judge for ourselves what might have pushed Bobby Fischer over the edge. We can't know for sure, but it makes for a very interesting book.

I also liked how the book explained chess, not just the rules, but the way different players approach the game. Brady cites games between Fischer and the legends of chess in a way only those who truly know the game can. I have a whole new respect for chess after reading this book.

This is no Kitty Kelly biography, it's more like reading a textbook. It's not a book you pick up to distract yourself on the beach, but it is certainly worth the effort to climb inside the head of a genius who choose to play chess.

Review:

No other chess match or game has captured the world's attention more than the 1972 World Championship match between challenger Bobby Fischer of the United States and champion Boris Spassky of the Soviet Union. After winning this match, Fischer became a huge celebrity and this extra attention also showed the world the other side of the man. His life both before and after this event is covered in this biography written by Frank Brady.

It illustrates a young man who was raised along with his sister by a single mother who was chasing dreams of her own. He would spend a lot of his free time at chess clubs or in the library learning as much of the game as he could and using a small chess set to simulate the games. Fischer's ability to memorize and analyze thousands of games and game situations is well documented and helped him on the way to the championship.

What is also well documented and described is Fischer's personality, which shows some bizarre characteristics as well. He would often make outrageous demands for business deals or for conditions before he would participate in matches. Most of the time, these demands were eventually met, but it showed his lack of negotiating skills, taking the "my way or the highway" approach.

It is also well-known that Fischer would engage in behavior or outbursts that were paranoid, anti-Semitic, or otherwise far from ordinary. These eventually caught up to Fischer and led him to isolationism, eventually landing him in Iceland where he settled after a nomadic life that had to end because he wore out his welcome in most nations. It is also important to note that he was facing tax evasion charges in the United States. His family was also regularly investigated by the FBI because of their connections with Russia - his mother for her studies and Fischer for his interest because chess was highly regarded there.

All of these are combined together to make a very intriguing and entertaining biography of a brilliant but troubled man. There is chess talk in the book as well, but not too far in depth. Therefore, a non-chess buff will enjoy this book as well as an enthusiastic player or fan.

Did I skim?
No

Did I learn something new?
Yes. Most of what I learned that was new was about his relationships with his mother and sister, as those were reported in the media as strained. While unusual, the book portrayed these relationships as loving, not estranged as was often reported. The regret that Fischer shows when he cannot attend his mother's funeral or face arrest in the United States is a good example of this.

Pace of the book:
Very good. It doesn't drag too slowly and the sections on Fischer's important chess matches make you feel you are there in the chair next to him.

Positives:
Outstanding research is evident in this book as many minute details of Fischer's famous rants and demands from tournament officials are shared. The author was able to glean many minute and obscure details that made this very rich and vivid for the reader.

Negatives:
I would have liked to see more in-depth writing about the actual chess games in some of the matches. An example is during the second match with Spassky, many games toward the end ended in a draw as Fischer wrapped up the match early. Yes, these games may not have been key in deciding the outcome, but more than a simple sentence saying they ended in a draw would have been better.

Do I recommend?
Yes. Even if the reader is not interested in chess, Fischer's biography is a very interesting tale and any reader who likes good biographies will enjoy this book.

The story of Bobby Fischer is quite fascinating. However, this book does not go far enough to explain why Fischer, on the brink of becoming the world's greatest chess player and a millionaire, threw everything away and ended up living almost like a down-and-out in California, then trawling around Asia in search of young women like many older American and European men, and ending up spending his last days in Iceland.

The author knew Fischer personally for a long time but he obviously lost touch and provides little first-hand insight on his later years. He never met Fischer after he disappeared from public view and does not even seem to have tried to contact him.

As he is chairman of the Marshall Chess Club in New York, he concentrates a lot on never-ending accounts of chess competitions and games and lists of players that end up just overwhelming the reader.

He does not dig into Fischer's background to even try and find out who his real father was. Nor does he tell the reader enough about Fischer's extraordinary mother - a Communist who ended up living in East Germany and Nicaragua. Her death is dismissed in the second half of a sentences.

Fischer was technically a Jew as his mother was Jewish but he became an unhinged anti-Semite. The author does not really try to explain this.

Despite these criticism, this is a pretty good book overall and certainly worth reading but I feel a more detached writer could have done a better job. I have not read any other biographies of Fischer so perhaps there is a fuller version of his life out there somewhere.

Frank Brady clearly knows his subject. In ENDGAME: Bobby Fischer's Remarkable Rise and Fall - From America's Brightest Prodigy to the Edge of Madness, Brady discusses chess, Fischer's place in it, and Fischer's overall life in a way that's both insightful and moving.

You see, Fischer's mother was a very bright and loving woman, but someone who wasn't home a lot. She wanted her son to get the best education possible, but early on he took to chess and never looked back. Despite the fact that she didn't totally understand this at the level her son did, she made sure he had good mentors and excellent people around him to help him advance and succeed in his chosen field as a chess master, then later, as a chess grandmaster.

Brady met Fischer when Fischer was only ten years old, and his long baseline with Fischer helps to infuse this story with the wit, pathos, and genuine compassion only another chess master can have for someone so bright, so terribly gifted -- and so unable to live what most people would consider a "normal life" due to his own inner demons.

You see, Fischer sounds like the type of guy who'd be great to be around one day and terrible the next. He suffered from what surely sounds like manic depression (or bipolar disease, the more contemporary term for the same thing), and he didn't believe in getting treatment for it. Worse, when an idea that didn't make much sense (such as some of Fischer's anti-American rants, which came out of the blue to most folks) took root in his mind, it was almost impossible for those ideas to leave Fischer as he was like a man possessed.

Despite that, Fischer left behind a devoted wife, a devoted mistress, a child he acknowledged as his (but knew was not his, biologically), many friends, and some family -- but all of them wondered why Fischer, with all his smarts and his great chess ability, wasn't able to do more with his life and be happier with all he was able to achieve.

Fischer was a remarkable man in many senses, not all of them good. His story is ultimately that of the tragic hero, flawed in many senses, but ultimately still hopeful in that he did much of what he'd set out to do and still had compassion and empathy even to the end (no matter how well-disguised, and no matter how many anti-American or anti-Jewish epithets Fischer let go of along the way).

ENDGAME is an American classic in every sense of the world, about an American original, Bobby Fischer, written by someone who knew him very well and is unstinting in both his praise and condemnation.

Five stars. Highly recommended for everyone (not just chess players), as reading ENDGAME is like studying a contemporary version of King Lear before, during, and after his fall.

Barb Caffrey

I used to watch Bobby Fischer play at the Marshall Chess Club way back when he was a teenager and I was a young boy. There was a rage to play in his eyes as well as a killer's instinct to eviscerate his opponent. His genius was evident to even the most haphazard observer. Fischer had an aggressive style of play that was brilliantly creative, manufacturing combinations that were often magical in their evolution from difficult positions. But there was a nervousness and a discomfort in his own skin that was obvious as well. Even as he climbed the ladder of chess success there was something not quite comfortable in his manner, as if he viewed his increasing ability with suspicion. Fischer was the very embodiment of a tortured soul.

Frank Brady has captured the essence of this Mozart of chess as well as anyone can. It is impossible to view the mind of a genius without inevitable fragmentation. A man who can play 70 simultaneous chess games coherently, without losing either his concentration or his position on the chess board, and winning almost all of them, may not have a single, knowable personality. Mozart, too, was many men wrapped in a single enigma of towering creativity. Read this book for a glimpse of the tragedy that was the great Bobby Fischer. Despite his decline he was, at least until age 29, one of the towering creative geniuses in history. And I still miss seeing him play.

During one of his summers as a teenager, Bobby Fischer played or studied chess 12 hours a day, 7 days a week. When I read about this, I think "What a great summer!" (at least if you subsitute go for chess). But too much obsession with one thing can have its downsides, as this book vividly demonstrates.

The first half of the book is an exciting description of Bobby Fischer's meteoric rise to the top of the chess world, crowned by winning the world championship from Spassky in 1972, at age 29. Already at this age, however, he seemed to not deal very well with reality off of the chess board. In addition to being a high-maintenance diva in negotiating the conditions of matches, he was involved in strange religious cults, paranoid, distrusting of doctors, etc.

After winning the world championship, he had nothing left to prove, or maybe just a severe case of burnout, and descended into stunnning obscurity, wandering from one place to another like a crazy semi-homeless person, reading voraciously on all sorts of topics. (This also doesn't sound like such a bad life, if only he had taken better care of himself.) He briefly re-emerged for a rematch against Spassky in 1992 in Yugoslavia, and afterwards, since his participation in this match violated US sanctions, to avoid imprisonment in the US he was forced to spend the rest of his life in exile in various countries. He had many friends and supporters who helped him out, but he alienated one after another with his uncompromising personality and hate-filled rants. He died in Iceland after refusing proper medical treatment for an illness.

The book is fast-paced and easy to read, but will make you think. No knowledge of chess is required.

Although this book fills in the darker missing parts to Fischer's life; and in the second half carefully chronicles his descent into anti-Semitic madness, I still prefer to remember the boy wonder (the David) who slew the great Russian Bear (Goliath); the giant that had ruled the chess kingdom for more than three decades. It was a Cold War battle royal that no one who lived it will ever forget.

When Fischer came to Denver in the summer of 1972, I was teaching at the University of Denver and my chess hero at the time was not even Fischer, but the young dashing Dane Bent Larsen who came to Denver specifically to play Fischer in a qualifying match to see who would play for the world chess championship. Never had interest and enthusiasm in chess been so high in the U.S. generally and in Denver in particular than during this period.

I remember those days so well because I played the then Hungarian Champion Svetozar Gligoric (who was also in Denver to report on the Fischer-Larsen match) in a simultaneous exhibition of 75 people and after 12 hours was graciously "awarded" a draw, down one pawn after 56 moves. I had predicted Larsen would, not just beat Fischer, but would do so soundly. I felt confident in this prediction because, even before it later became Fischer's defining quality, at the time Larsen was alone the single Grandmaster defined by his "take no prisoners, go for broke" attacking approach. Whenever Larsen lost, you knew it was because, among other things, he was trying to "go for the win," and to "avoid settling for a draw." For Larsen, it was kill or be killed on the chess board. That is why all of Larsen's games (before Fischer), were like mini works of chess art: Combinations and middle-of-the-board fireworks were his middle name.

Yet, in that Denver match, Bobby annihilated him by beating him six in a row, with no draws, as he went on to rack up an unprecedented 19 wins in grandmaster play without a lost or even a draw (19-0)! Nothing like that had ever happened in grandmaster play, and is unlikely to ever happen again. That is the Bobby Fischer I prefer to remember. I do not begrudge Brady for telling it like it is, even though it tarnishes one of my heroes. Here he allows the chips to fall where they may, and that is as it should be.

And if we are entirely honest with ourselves, it must be said that even then, Bobby exhibited clear signs that he was "a few French fries short of a Happy Meal." But that is like saying that Babe Ruth went nuts after he led the Yankees to the World Series? Who really cares? I still think it was wrong to threaten to jail him for violating sanctions, only for playing a single match in Yugoslavia. As crimes went in those days, this hounding Fischer all across the globe for the better part of a decade, amounted to shameless high level political harassment, one would think well beneath the dignity of a first world country.

Still thanks for the memories, Frank. Four stars.

I grew up observing the progress of Bobby Fischer's chess career, admiring the power of his mind as he sought the world championship. Even during his early career, there were disturbing signs, but nothing to predict the appalling descent into bigotry and irrational hatred that seemed to drive his final years. Frank Brady, a man who knew Fischer and his family well enough to claim some real insight into that behavior, has tried to present a sympathetic but critical (sometimes damning) portrait of Fischer's peculiar worldview. Some passages of this biography read like vividly narrated fiction, but one never loses confidence that Brady is doing his best to be honest and precise wherever he can. The description of Fischer's last years, stuck in Japan, then having moved to Iceland, and his lonely death, is truly saddening, even though it is impossible to muster either admiration or respect for Fischer during his final months. His tendency to turn on and vilify people who have treated him with kindness, even to the extent of helping him financially and in other ways, is impossible to accept. It would be nice to be able to think of Fischer as a tragic figure, but too much of his behavior seems to have been wilful and malicious, so even his great achievements are undermined by the condemnation that he earned. Brady's book is a valiant effort and is fascinating reading for anyone interested in the chess, in the travails of brilliant minds twisted by experience, or even the cold war context in which Fischer consciously played a strange but effective role.

The author of this book, Frank Brady, met Bobby Fischer at a chess tournament when they were both very young (Fischer was a child and the Brady was a teenager). Brady kept in touch with Fischer throughout most of Fischer's life, and knew many of the people that had also crossed paths with Fischer over the years. This personal closeness between author and his subject makes Endgame a very thorough and affecting biography of Fischer.

According to the book's forward, Brady purposefully shied away from inserting himself into the book and tried to stay as objective as possible, even when Brady had been a participant in the very scenes of Bobby Fischer's life that he describes. I found myself wishing that he had revealed more of his personal feelings about their shared experiences.

The story of Fischer's life is a tragic one but, even so, this book portrays him in such a way that I had trouble mustering much sympathy for him. However, likable or not, Fischer is an iconic figure who is well worth reading about. This book is so meticulous crafted that it should certainly be considered a definitive volume about the troubled chess grandmaster's life.

I enjoyed reading the book, thought it well written, but felt there was a lot missing.

For example, who was Bobby Fischer's father? Brady says incredibly little about this, does not seem to expend any effort to figure it out.

For example, although Larry Evans wrote the game intros to Fischer's book "My 60 Memorable Games", there is virtually nothing about Larry Evans in the book. All I can remember is the story about the car ride back from Canada. Surely, Larry Evans must have had some insight into what made Bobby Fischer tick. But Brady says nothing about trying to interview Evans to get more insight into Fischer.

Why did Fischer perform poorly at the Buenos Aires tournament? Brady recounts some rumors, but again does not seem to advance the knowledge.

Ultimately, Brady did not seem to understand what was the cause of Bobby Fischer's rise and fall. I don't think anyone really understands. I just wish Brady had taken more effort to find out. Maybe he did, but it was not obvious from the book.

Warning: If you don't play chess, a lot of this book may not make sense, may be hard to relate to.

What disappointed about this biography was the refusal of the author to attempt an explanation for Fischer's mental illness. It's pretty clear that Fischer suffered from delusional disorder. This uncontroversial diagnosis makes much sense of Fischer's behavior in later life, but why doesn't the offer mention it? If the subject of a biography is physically sick for a good part of his life a good biography will describe the disease, the possible causes, etc. Shouldn't the same standard be applied to mental illness? Granted a biography with dozens of pages of psychological explanation and speculation would probably end up terrible, but not offering any explanation or analysis of Fischer's mental health is faulty as well.

Also, why did Fischer become an anti-semite? This probably could not be answered without lots of (probably wrong) speculation, but it seems possible or likely a later biographers will be able to offer much more explanation as to how Fischer's ideological mindset developed into what it was.

Overall though, this was a good biography and I enjoyed reading it. The most interesting and illuminating part was for me the story of Fischer's teenage years and experience in international tournaments before he became chess champion. Definitely a good biography, but I won't be surprised if there is a more compelling and complete one that will be written in the future!

Before launching into a review of a bio of Fischer, I'd like to disclose my personal biases which may influence my review of the book. Like many tournament chess players who started that hobby in the early 70s, I was a product of the "Fischer Boom". I knew of Fischer and his previous monumental successes through his chess column in Boy's Life magazine, and later his book, "My 60 Memorable Games". Those exposures led me to believe that Fischer was a personable and friendly man with a playful and helpful spirit. I wasn't to learn for many years that all of his chess columns and most of the prose in his book were ghost written by Larry Evans, and the positive qualities I ascribed to Fischer were in fact those of Evans. Later, when Fischer won the World Championship, he was even more cemented in the role of hero of American Chess that he had already filled for more than a decade. Many of us were shocked when he then went into severe seclusion, and fatally sabotaged any chance of defending his title against Anatoly Karpov three years later.Fischer gradually faded from the consciousness of most chess fans and tournament players, finally re-emerging in 1992 to play a privately sponsored rematch against Boris Spassky. Both men were paid handsomely for the match, with the major problem being that they were being paid by war criminals whom the US State Department had already proscribed any business contact with by US citizens. An arrest warrant was put out for Fischer, and he never returned to his native land. Fischer may have already harbored a resentment for America, but regardless of whether one already existed, this episode placed Fischer fully at odds with his homeland. He was unceasingly critical of the USA for the rest of his life, in a manner consistent with the way he had attacked everything and everyone that at some point became the target of his lifelong paranoid fantasies. I still had some sympathies for Fischer until he publicly stated after 9/11 that the USA "deserved" the attack. I realized at that point that Fischer was irredeemable, as he was actually celebrating the murder of more than 3000 innocent civilians in the city he grew up in and from which he launched his early successes.

Brady has written books about chess off and on for decades, and wrote an earlier book on Fischer, "Profile of a Prodigy". He knew Fischer at least from personal meetings, but as has been mentioned by others, it is unlikely that anyone really KNEW Fischer. Ultimately Fischer suspected and rejected even long time friends and associates like Larry Evans, who would have done nothing but give him good advice. I'll have to say that most of the "powers that be" in the chess world did Fischer no good on a personal level. Fischer was so difficult to deal with and so unpredictably bratty that people tended to take extraordinary actions in attempts to get him to play in important events, even including his successful world championship match, that were just as good for American chess organization as they were personally for Fischer. What Fischer needed was consistent rejection of his own poor behavior, and maybe he would have adapted in a positive fashion. Instead those in contact with him coddled him to the point of becoming enablers. Everyone is certainly responsible for their own individual behavior, but it is certain that Fischer got little help in the form of external influences, and rejected the advice and relationships of the few who tried to be honest with him.Brady's book seems a bit like those enablers, and seems to want to play both sides of the street. He doesn't want to completely reveal the deeper reason for Fischer's behavior, even tho all the episodes (call them tantrums) are reported. I can only imagine that he is walking the tightrope between alienating those who might still regard themselves as fans of Fischer, while at the same time providing an expose for those either interested in or revelling in the man's fall from grace, and participation in any sort of a normal life. So if you are interested in a fill in the blanks sort of story about eras in Fischer's life about which you are in the dark, you'll get that here.

If you are looking for a frank appraisal of the depths of the reasons for Fischer's increasingly depraved behavior, you'll find that somewhat glossed over.I give the book only three stars for three reasons:First, because I feel that it is more in line with yet another attempt by the world around Fischer to cash in on what remains of his fame, rather than motivated by a desire to reveal the truth about the man.

Second, because in his attempt to make the story of Fisher's life more "interesting", he has engaged in page after page of embellished surmises. Granted that Brady knew Fisher for a long time. However, he repeatedly dreams up descriptions of events where he was not present and indulges himself in seemingly endless minutiae. A description of Fisher's thought process at age 6 as he solves a page in a puzzle book ... the description of traffic and noise on a street where Fisher walked, in another incident before Brady even knew him ... the list goes on. Its as if Brady finds the facts too difficult to make interesting, so he must arrange flowers around them to pretty them up for the reader.

For me personally, I find it tedious when an author embellishes a biography with fanciful fictional notions for "my benefit". Tell me what happened Frank. Tell me what you know people said. Don't give me a blow by blow of words you imagine might have gone though Bobby's mind during an event at which you were not present.

Third, the last half of the book is particularly dull, not to mention very depressing. Only the Spassky rematch livens things up a bit, but Brady doesn't really bring much life to even that high note of Fischer's post 1972 life. Granted, Brady doesn't have much to work with. Fischer's life post 1972 was indeed particularly dull and depressing. It doesn't even serve as a cautionary tale from which you might learn life lessons. Fischer's behaviour was so far out that not many readers are likely to be in a similar position from which they can learn from Fischer's mistakes. About the only lesson from Fischer's later life would be: "Don't be abusively and ignorantly rude to those trying to befriend you". However, the lack of good source material isn't an excuse. Brady chose his subject and its framework, then failed to elevate it to an interesting read. Maybe some readers are interested in a lengthy blow by blow of the opportunistic and unseemly squabbling over what was left of Fischer's 1992 prize after his death. I wasn't. Of course, that sordid story was left unfinished, so even it had no satisfactory sense of completion.

For myself, I ceased to have any feeling whatsoever for Fischer after his 9/11 remarks. It is possible to disagree with and disapprove of actions taken by your country without crossing the line to become a traitor. I personally feel that Fischer crossed that line, and his mental illness is not a good enough reason to excuse him for it.

A well-researched and interesting account of a fascinating genius. Endgame taught me several lessons:

1) Chess is much more than the game I used to play with my grandfather. Brady superbly provides enough context to orient the reader while not diving into the chess details and overwhelming those, such as myself, who aren't well versed in the game. I didn't think that Chess could read so exciting.

2) Even with genius, hard work is required. I'm not sure what I thought, but I had assumed that visionaries like Fischer simply saw the game in a different way that allowed them to dominate. Brady's picture shows Fischer not only having incredible insights but also an incredible work ethic and competitive drive that pushed him towards the top.

3) Some skills can work for you, others can work against you. In this case, Bobby's genius allowed him to become the World Chess Champion. However, that same genius eventually drove him to be a recluse and angry.

A very interesting read that gave me good insights into a person and game that I had previously not been exposed to. Glad I picked it up.

Former World Chess Champion Bobby Fischer was insensitive toward most people who admired him, self-absorbed in his worldview, disloyal to his closest friends, and hateful of any person or government he felt wronged him, including Russia, whose chess players he believed were in collusion to prevent his ascendency to the world chess title; the United States, for what he claimed was a deliberate attempt to destroy him financially; and Japan, for imprisoning him as a fugitive from US justice and traveling with an allegedly invalid passport. The son of a Jewish woman, Fischer reserved his greatest wrath for Jews, denying the Holocaust and vicious toward those who challenged his assertions. The Jews were in a worldwide conspiracy, he insisted, for all the evils of the world and needed to wiped out summarily. On September 11, 2001, from the Philippines, he unleashed a vulgar invective against the US and cheered the demise of the Twin Towers. In his final years, he was even mean-spirited toward the Icelanders, the only people who welcomed him to the haven of their country as he faced extradition to the US to stand trial for having a 1992 rematch with Boris Spassky in Yugoslavia. In doing so, Fischer broke a UN embargo and US order to desist from any business with Yugoslavia, a country engaged in a civil war and whose leader was considered an international outlaw. Fischer was a paranoid who removed the fillings from his teeth because he suspected that the material in them was harmful to his health. He became a fanatical member of the Worldwide Church of God and was equally engrossed in his militancy toward them when he no longer appreciated what he assumed was their bilking him of his income. He turned down millions of dollars in endorsements and chess matches based on abstruse or downright bizarre premises and harbored a persecution complex his entire adult life that caused him to become a recluse, virtually homeless for a time, entirely dependent on his mother's Social Security check for sustenance. His inability to maintain enduring relationships sent him from his Brooklyn apartment to live for long stretches in California, Germany, Hungary, Japan, the Philippines, and finally Iceland, where he died at age 64.

This same strange personality became a chess prodigy before age 10, won the legendary "game of the century" at 13 against Chess Master Donald Byrne; won an astounding eight US championships, once with an unprecedented perfect score of 11 wins, 0, draws, and 0 losses; and on the road to becoming champion won matches with perfect scores against the USSR's Mark Taimanov and Denmark's Bent Larsen, before nearly shutting out the USSR's Tigran Petrosian. While his unpredictable conduct nearly cost him a chance at the world title by forfeit, he made a last-minute appearance in Reykjavik to wrestle away the world chess crown from Spassky in 1972 after a quarter-century of a Soviet stranglehold on the claim. He inspired millions of people to buy chess sets, many more to learn the game, and by many Icelanders' estimation, put Iceland on the map. He won the love of world leaders everywhere. He had an inexhaustible memory for important chess games throughout the century and could visualize countless possibilities of combinations during openings, mid-games and endgames.

Without bias, Frank Brady, a long-time acquaintance of Fischer and devoted follower of his personal life and chess career, deftly explains the beginnings of Fischer's meteoric rise, offers insights into his idiosyncrasies, and describes the functioning world around this genius. This book is clearly the definitive look at a unique life from the perspective of an insider.

1. Here are my bottomline thoughts regarding this book:
a. First of all, I've never played chess and it's highly probable that I'll ever play chess.
b. Second, I was born in the mid 60s and thus wasn't around to consciously appreciate the Bobby Fischer phenomena, but like most folks, I've certainly heard of him and his association with being the master of chess.
c. With the above being said, I would perhaps be the most unlikely person to have an interest in this book, but this is the beauty of this book. It is just masterfully written and the life of Bobby Fischer is reminiscent of some Shakespearean tragedy. The highest of praise to Frank Brady for shedding the life of Bobby Fischer to us ordinary folks.

Frank Brady might have confined himself to writing a worth-while memoir of his time with Bobby Fischer before 1972, but instead gives us something much better -- a compelling and well-written biography of the enigmatic world chess champion covering the whole of Bobby's life, drawing on some interesting sources such as FBI and KGB documents.

You don't have to be interested in chess to enjoy this book. I'm not a chess maven and I regularly lose to my 10-year-old son, but became interested in Fischer a few years ago when I picked up a remaindered copy of Bobby Fischer Goes to War, about the 1972 series in Iceland. This book, Endgame, forgoes the move-by-move analysis or even the game-by-game analysis of Fischer's competitions and focuses instead on Bobby Fischer, the mind behind the moves.

Fischer succeeded in alienating many, many people in his life, but Fischer remains sympathetic while showing us the worst of Bobby's behavior. Loyal Brady simply will not admit that Fischer was mentally ill, but presents us with examples of Bobby's thoughts and deeds that make it absolutely clear that's what he was. I'm not a psychiatrist, but I've had to interact closely with diagnosed paranoid schizophrenics several times in my professional life and Brady's description of Fischer is spot-on.

People were often willing to grant Fischer a lot of leeway, probably much more than he deserved. The story of how the Polgar family of Hungary (with the chess-genius sisters) welcomed Bobby is typical and sad. The Polgars are Hungarian Jews, a group of people who were almost extinguished in the Holocaust's final crescendo of autumn 1944. That the Polgars forgave Fischer his rants and Holocaust denial for even a day, much less the months they put up with his nonsense, shows me the Polgars exhibited a basic human decency absent in Fischer's personality.

I wish a bit more attention had been paid to Fischer's mother, and the extent to which she was a moral influence on him. Notably, she, like Bobby, combined both intellectual brilliance and political credulity. She did, however, seemed to have a moral center that failed to be passed along to Bobby.

Finally, I had hoped Brady would address the rumors that Fischer had, late in life, played chess over the Internet using a pseudonym. Bobby being what he was, no book will ever be the last word. Brady's Endgame, though, comes very close.

If one is to think about controversial people that affected American modern history, then Bobby Fischer certainly fits the bill. Written by Mr. Brady, this biography discloses persona of Bobby Fischer that was known only to his closest frriends and associates. Bobby was raised by his single mother who struggled her entire life to provide a decent future for her daughter and son. In her attempt to do the best she could for them, she caused Bobby to live a life of loneliness and complete self-reliance and isolation. It is those early years and his inability to relate to children of his own generation, as well as constant moving from one part of the country to another that caused him to find some solace and happiness in playing the game of chess.

His early chess teachers served Bobby as both mentors and surrogate fathers. They made sure that Bobby was exposed to the right circle of friends that could foster his unmistakable talent for chess. Bobby's single minded devotion for the game propelled him towards success in the game that was unprescedented in the American history. Bobby became a brand in itself and his intense desire for privacy, financial independence and security have pushed him in a direction where his approach to chess translated to his approach towards everything and everyone else that became part of his life.

There is no doubt that Bobby was a complicated man. My impression from reading this biography is that his stuborness and determination certainly brought many changes in the sport of chess that most likely would not have happened if Bobby was not so insistent on them even to the point that it nearly ruined his life in every single aspect of it. Bobby's intolerance, determination to be the best player there ever was, his need for understanding of the way of the world, quest for spirituality that was his own, made him the person he was. His inner unhappiness, developed into anger that was expressed in a ways that was not always graceful, not to mention diplomatic.

This biography will provide an unbiased view of the man who fascinated the world regardless of his shortcomings. It is a story about genious who died at the age of 64 ravaged by his own choices in life he never publicly admitted he regretted.

Biographer Frank Brady had a monumental and foreboding task when he took on the life of Bobby Fischer. This is one complex and often confusing tale and one has to congratulate Brady for managing to keep it together and creating order out of a life that is liberally sprinkled with genius, confusion, contradiction and madness. This book clearly reflects Brady's ability to get as close to understanding the enigma known as chess grandmaster Bobby Fischer as anyone to date.
Robert James Fischer's life started out with ambiguity. Born in Chicago in 1943, it was questionable as to who his father actually was. What is known is that his mother Regina was an ardent communist and there was a disconnect between mother and son early on as the mother pursued her political interests and career aspirations while the son poured his high IQ into a single minded quest to become the uber chess grandmaster. Fischer's early life was isolated and he developed few meaningful personal relationships while he basked in the glory of his burgeoning reputation in the world of chess as the youngest, the brightest, and the best.
After his chess career peaked with his victory against Boris Spassky to win the World Championship of Chess, Fischer lead a somewhat nomadic life and espoused an anti-american stance and had a growing reputation as a virulent anti-semite (ironic given that his mother was Jewish as was his possible biological father). Compounding his personal tempest, were run-ins with the law which included a tirade against the police who detained him as a possible robbery suspect, unpaid taxes, and the violation of a UN embargo against Yugoslavia (after which he never returned to the U.S.). Sprinkled among his legal issues, there was a temporary alliance with conservative christianity and his denial of his jewish heritage. He even wrote a fan letter to Bin Laden. He eventually settled in Iceland after he was given citizenship there, having previously lived in diverse places such as the Phillipines and Japan.
He lived an isolated life in his adopted homeland with few friends and holed up in a small, unkempt apartment which echoed his physical appearance. At one point he depended upon his mother for rent money despite the fact that he had accumulated a nice fortune from chess winnings.
Even after Fischer's death in 2008, controversy that surrounded Fischer in life did not dissipate. A presumed Japanese wife, a presumed Phillipino daughter, and his nephews and brother-in-law all came forward to lay claim to his estate. In 2010, his remains were exhumed to settle the so-called daughter's claim. In the end it was determined that there was no biological relationship.
Honestly, this is a strange and fascinating story that details a descent into madness. I suspect that this will be a best seller.