Tal done-in Tal style!
"It is an ideology which gives the artist the right to despise the sitter's philistine relatives who cling to the outward husk and miss the essence." - E.H.Gombrich et al
It was not often that this great magician from Riga was shown some magic, it was great fun! But, my friend, magic demands a child like innocence and not a 'grown-up', 'knowledgeable' pretense! Magic demands that it is seen from afar..... don't bring in a magnifying glass and climb the platform in your inquisitiveness to see "how" and "what-ifs". The child's means are simple... all that a child needs is his/her lips to suck the milk, and the eyes to see the colours and twist the same lips to smile.... rest assured - your smile and mine is no match to it!! (now don't go to wikipedia to check at what stage the cones develop....it develops when it develops!)
Your author saw, devoured and now describes the magic through his naked....perhaps primitive eyes...! Play through this game on the chessboard - that you may have tucked in some corner of your study or loft (and don't fail to dust it...in case if you are allergic!!) - and see the game through your naked eyes: do not wear that filter called 'engine'; just your naked eyes and naked perception...you will discover the true beauty studded with human follies and believe me.... it is magical. Nature is best observed through naked eyes and not binoculars.... you will see more and derive more this way; nature is for those who are natural and not resort to unnatural means!
I BAN THE ENGINES for this game or for that matter any of the games that I try to paint with my crooked fingers....as I see through the games with my naked eyes and ignorant mind....for.....
....not only Descartes, but 'I too see and therefore I am'!!
Do you have some time for....? Else, you may skip the next few paragraphs and jump over to the game and let your fingers dance on the chessboard...as they play out the game!
Gombrich, whose quote adores the top of this article, wrote..."Art can be convincing without being objectively realistic. There must be reason for omission even beyond the appalling complexity of the problem. Somehow concern with likeness in portraiture bears the stamp of philistinism. It evokes the memory of quarrels between great artists and pompous sitters whose stupid wife (if you prefer husband, so be it) insists that there is still something wrong around the mouth....
Perception always stands in need of universals. We could not perceive and recognise our fellow creature if we could not pick out the essential and separate it from the accidental - in whatever language we may want to formulate this distinction. Today people prefer computer language, they speak of pattern recognition, picking up the invariants which are distinctive of an individual. It is the kind of skill for which even the most hardened computer designers envy the human mind, and not the human mind only, for the capacity of recognising identity in change which it presupposes must be built into the central nervous system even of animals. Consider what is involved in this perceptual feat of visually recognising an individual member of a species out of the herd, the flock, or the crowd. Not only will the light and the angle of vision change as it does with all objects, the whole configuration of the face is in perpetual movement, a movement which somehow does not affect the experience of physiognomic identity or, as I propose to call it, physiognomic constancy."
The problem lies in the conditioning of the mind, and, despise that mind that craves for perfection, perfect moves, 'correct' moves - chess mind progresses by widening the area of perception and not deepening in limited spheres...and this requires opening up and perpetual unlearning!
Not only art with its curves, shades and hues, but chess too cannot and need not have -0.01 or 1.90 and perfect moves and befitting patterns and correctness... Let the numbers do its business where it has to, and the colours and the movements, where it has to and not trespass the borders!
White: Mikhail Tal vs Black: Igor Platonov
(36th USSR Championship, Alma Ata - 1969)
It is said that the Ukranian Soviet Grandmaster strode the chess arena only for four or five years, as a player, and we may not have an answer for "why"... history and soviet history in particular has its own ways!
The opening moves hold no secrets for the erudite as well as the novice.
(why, even to the '.....' {I find even 'cheat' a decent name to refer these scoundrels} who is resorting to some device to devise...., both the bathroom and his mind stink unbearably).
And I don't want to pretend to know the secrets of opening, therefore....
15) f3 Nfd7; 16) f4!?
Do you know why the pawn moved step by step? Perhaps 15.f3 did not influence the Knight to move but plausibly 16) f4 was influenced by Nfd7. In the heat of the battle, the swords are swung and until it touches the neck of your enemy or atleast is wielded in the close proximity of his neck, you cannot probe and find A meaning for a particular swing.... "it" just happens.
In this aspect, what James Mason wrote in 1800's stands indelible and matchless: "That due knowledge of any subject not perfectly simple in itself implies exact knowledge of its elements or parts is a truism remarkably appropriate to chess. Now to form just ideas of the parts or elements of which chess consists, it is necessary to consider them each separately at first, and not to confound them all into one view, so that, as it were, we cannot see the wood of the trees. A player in a fog as to the movements of two or three pieces - what will he do with two-and-thirty? But having mastered the parts, then a correct method will enable us to trace their connections and interactions, until we may eventually perceive them working together according to that controlling principle of unity in diversity which is the last to be discovered in the actual game. Well, the acquisition of this knowledge through study is one thing; its application in practice, "over the board", is another very different thing. We must apply our knowledge as a whole, as best we may, to the interpretation of facts and ideas of play as they appear to us from move to move on the field of conflict; but that knowledge must have come to us by degrees, in the way of better perception, rounding into sounder judgment of position and general strengthening of our chess powers."
The hindsight spoils the ability to devour the process inch by inch! Now watch further move by move, motionless - this game's surprises are hidden in its apparent simplicity!
16) ....gf4; 17) Bf4 b4; 18) ab4 Rb4;
Both Tal and Platonov are opening lines for operation, after all you require space for movements!
19) Rf1 Qb6
Some visible threats started appearing.
20) b3 Ng6; 21) Bh5!? Rd4!
Cleverly sidestepping the mine set by Bh5!? If 21....e5? 22.Nd5 and Qe1 gobbles material with impunity!
22) Rd4 Nf4; 23) Rf4
23).....Bg5!
Sidestepping mine-2: 23) .....e5; 24) Rf7! rips Black to pieces!
24) Bf7 Kd8! 25) e5
Else, Black will actually play it now, what remained as a mere threat!!
25) .....Rf8! 26) Ne2 Rf7; 27) h4 Bf4; 28) Nf4 d5;
The multiple pin's played havoc and Black emerges a piece to good, but the game is not over yet! Material imbalance is just an usual sight that you get to see in Tal's games, but on this occasion it is just that it was not an intentional sacrifice of material, probably a result of Black's resounding play after the unprovoked f4!? Tal games are beautiful even in his loses - a true warrior!
29) g4!? Rg7; 30) g5 hg5; 31) hg5 Ke8!! 32) Nh5 Rh7!!
The double exclamation marks are for the amazing coolness with which Black executes his strategy or unveils his plans! In the midst of melee, Platonov allows Tal to get connected passed pawns on the sixth rank and proceeds as if nothing significant is happening!! Try doing this in one of your tournament games to see how your heart will start pounding!
33) Nf6 Nf6; 34) ef6 Rh1; 35) Kb2 Rh4!
The deadly pin, again! The whole concept of Black's play revolved around the unfortunate positioning of White's Rook on d4 and f4 with the Queen on e3 and the King on c1....a constellation which allowed various pins.
36) c3 Rh2; 37) Ka3 Rc2! 38) Qh3 Qa5
Both the Queens are flirting! Black King is also 'naked' but White King is nude and hence.... (wait until dark!)
39) Ra4 Qc5; 40) Rb4 a5; 41) Qh8
When one stops the other starts!!
41) .....Kd7; 42) Qh7 Kc6; 43) Qc2 ab4; 44) Ka2 bc3; 45) g6 e5! 46) f7 Be6!
Halts the pawn march any further. The game is over, but the two artists on the board enthrals us defying a banal resignation!
47) Qd3 Qf2!; 48) Ka3 Qa7; 49) Kb4 Kc5; 50) Ka4 c2! 51) f8=Q Qa7; 52) Kb4 Qb7; 53) Ka4 c1=Q
54) Qff1 Qf1; 55) Qa7 Kb4; 56) Qc5 Ka4; 57) Kb6!
The curtains are downed and it is dark!
A remarkable game vibrant under its simple facade! Hope you enjoyed it thoroughly as I did!
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