“Chess is like acting”
Interview with Viswanathan Anand in Der Spiegel
Published on ChessBase
SPIEGEL: Mr Anand, in two weeks you will be defending your title as World Champion against the Russian Grandmaster Vladimir Kramnik in Bonn [Germany]. Two weeks ago you finished last in the Masters Tournament in Bilbao. Is that a psychological handicap?
Anand: Thank you very much for bringing that up. It reminds me of John Cleese from Monty Python. In Fawlty Towers a group of Germans visits his hotel, and he admonishes his staff not to mention the war to them – while he himself can talk about nothing else. So please: don’t mention Bilbao.
SPIEGEL: Okay, then on to Bonn. The World Championship goes over eight games, with a possible tiebreak. You have known Kramnik for nineteen years. Can he still surprise you?
Anand: We have been playing in the same events since 1993. But there is a difference if you know someone and if you understand him. In the past twenty years Kramnik has played a few thousand games, and if you show me a position from one of them, in 90 percent of the time I will be able to tell you which game it is from. But one cannot conclude from that that I can see through him. In fact I expect him to surprise me. And vice versa, logically.
SPIEGEL: How did you prepare for the World Championship?
Anand: I have been studying Kramnik since the end of April, up to ten hours a day, here at home in my cellar, where I have my office. I have a database and construct game plans. I try to neutralise positions in which Kramnik is strong. He is doing the same thing with my game, which I must of course take into consideration. Let me put it this way: I must remember that he is thinking about what I am thinking about him. In any case one is working for months with the computer, trying to find new paths.
SPIEGEL: Computers are becoming more and more important. Has chess become a preparation game – whoever is better prepared wins?
Anand: That was always the case. Today we analyse our games with the computer, in the 16th century people did it with a board. That is only a gradual difference. Preparation for a world championship was always an arms race, in previous times with books, then with seconds, today with computers. The computer is an excellent training partner. It helps me to improve my game.
Here is the full article on ChessBase.
Anand is great. I like him.
He is an interesting man and he talks about chess in style.
I love Monty Python! Vishy has some great taste in humour!
Click my name to see some classic Python action!
Even Non-German-Speakers can spot the wrong translation:
German Original:
“Es geht bei der WM über maximal zwölf Partien und eventuell in den Tiebreak.”
English:
“The World Championship goes over eight games, with a possible tiebreak.”
Mistake:
“Zwoelf” means “Twelve” and not “Eight”.
Finally we will witness a World Championship Match between the consistently best chess players over the last 15 years (apart from retired Kasparov of course…)
They shared first place in the rating lists at the beginning of the year and their recent little drop in ratings is obviously due to their not showing the best opening lines prior to the match rather than anything else.(the leading 5 players are still within 8 rating points and Kramnik is just 11 points away from Anand. That’s as close as it can get…)
Like the former matches Spassky-Fischer, Karpov-Korchnoi and Kasparov-Karpov it really brings together the best players of our time in a match for the title.
The next two players “in waiting” are Carlsen (of course) and maybe Morozevich…
Topalov is just a side-show IMO and after loosing his match to Kramnik in 2006 I don’t understand why he is in the race for the title … hopefully Kamsky wins that match…
Wow. Great interview. His way of answering to questions that are posed is nice. I wish him all the best for world championship match.
Anand consistancy is amazing. He is in TOP 3 continously since 1998.
Recently his ranking has fallen to 5 th.
Anand has no consistency. It’s all an act. All the games after Bobby-Boris were pre-arranged, according to my friend Bobby.