Media comments on chess

[Stewart Reuben]

LIFE OF A KING
Sky/Virgin Movies Premier stating Friday 9 May shown at 4.15pm. Some other times in the ensuing week.
Cuba Gooding Jnr. and Dennis Haysbert star. Director Jake Goldberger. US.
Loosely based on a true story. A former jailbird teaches teenagers chess. This instils a sense of hope and purpose in some.

[Adam Raoof]

19 minutes into the programme - Golders Green Rapidplay!

BBC RADIO 4, "IN DEFENCE OF PUSHY PARENTS"

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b042jpk2


AIRED WEDNESDAY, MAY 7, 2014
11:00 - 11:30 AM

Presenter: Rosie Millard
Producer: Max O'Brien
A Juniper production for BBC Radio 4


Picked on by the media, feared by teachers, banned from the touchlines on sports day - pushy parents are public enemy number one. In this programme, self-professed pushy parent Rosie Millard launches a spirited defence, arguing that pushy parents are a much maligned force within society.

Rosie's view is not a popular one, from psychologists who warn that overbearing parenting can damage a child's health, to teachers who argue that they spend more time dealing with pushy parents than they do actually teaching, there are no shortage of people lining up to have a pop.

With Britain's children slipping down the international league tables, Rosie hears from controversial "Tiger-Mom" Amy Chua who explains that the hard-line East Asian parenting style instils within children discipline and focus that is lacking from many children in the West.

In Manchester, Rosie speaks to the head teacher at one of the country's top primary schools who states that her school's consistently excellent results would simply not be possible without its bevy of pushy parents.

Rosie argues that being a pushy parent is about more than just a child's education, it's also about helping your children blossom through extracurricular pursuits. At the Golders Green Rapidplay Chess Tournament, Rosie meets 9 year old chess prodigy Joshua Altman and his "hardcore chess mum" Hillary.

Pushy parents also play a vital role in spurring on youngsters for sporting successes, we hear from Paralympic gold medallist Josef Craig who explains that his medal glory would have been impossible without his parents' drive and support.

[Stewart Reuben]

'LIFE OF A KING' was quite a good film, but a bit didactic in its support for the idea that chess helps people cope.

I can now think of 4 films in which chess in US Schools played a big part.
HATLEY HIGH is quite different. There are many films about pupils in schools who are besotted with a sport. In this case, the sport is chess. It is purely fictional and could perhaps be described as satirical, but perhaps not.

[David Gilbert]

Did anyone come across last week’s episode of “Bones”? It was a chess club murder! Albert Magnuson is the victim (Isn't "Albert" Magnus Carlsen's father's name? - clever script writing eh!). Everyone at the club is stereotypically geeky. The first main suspect had been thrown out of the club for previously breaking Albert Magnuson’s arm with a “clock timer”, after Magnuson had accused him of cheating (by using vibrated morse code messages on his iPhone - Lord Rutherford eat your heart out!)). In the next scene we find the suspect giving a simul in the local park, but he has an alibi. It turns out that many male American chess players are unattractive to women. On the night of the murder he was trying to pick-up a prostitute who turned out to be an under-cover cop, and he had spent the night in jail. It happens all the time!

[Ian Thompson]

Did anyone come across last week’s episode of “Bones”? It was a chess club murder! Albert Magnuson is the victim (Isn't "Albert" Magnus Carlsen's father's name? - clever script writing eh!).

Only if they deliberately chose his middle name, and who's likely to know that without looking it up before almost telling you you'd got it completely wrong . His name is Henrik Albert Carlsen.

[Neill Cooper]

"The aim we should have is not to grab Ukraine like a piece on a chess board and yank it towards Europe. Ukraine should be a bridge between Europe and Russia. Ukraine needs to have a proper relationship with Russia as well as a good relationship with Europe. It's not a zero-sum game and I am not sure the Russians have understood that that is the intention."

Prime Minister David Cameron appearing before the Liaison Committee giving evidence about the Government's response to the Ukraine crisis and the actions of Russian president Vladimir Putin
http://www.expressandstar.com/news/uk-n ... r-ukraine/ [Also broadcast on BBC Radio 4 news 11pm today.]

[Stewart Reuben]

Janni Russell in The Times Opinion 15 May.

'Scott, like so many children in care, was treated as if he were a chess pieces who could be moved around a board while remaining his own solid, unchanging self.

[JustinHorton]

And on a similar and not at all overworked theme, here's El País in English:

She ruled over people’s destinies like a chess master moving pieces on a board

[Jonathan Bryant]

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/m ... y-kasparov

[Geoff Chandler]

Apparently....I missed it!

On Pointless last night at the 'Head to Head' the subject was Chess.

These were the questions:

From Mrs C's memory - which usually is very good as she can remember everything I've ever done wrong since 1977.

Who was the World Champion from 1972 - 1975.
(Point of order - did Bobby not lose his title by default in 1974 when he said he would not defend it?)

How many pieces in a Chess Set.
(Point of order - a chess player may say 16 - the question should be, how may chessmen.)

Who are the ruling body of Chess.

Name the computer that Beat Kasparov.

What is the piece than can only move diagonally.

[Ian Thompson]

On Pointless last night at the 'Head to Head' the subject was Chess.

These were the questions:

From Mrs C's memory - which usually is very good as she can remember everything I've ever done wrong since 1977.

Not bad recollection, but not exactly right. These were the exact questions (and numbers of people knowing the answers):

Pointless.jpg (97.06 KiB) Viewed 1741 times

[Clive Blackburn]

I think that saying it was a US world champion would have helped a lot of non-chess players to the right answer, it was a top news story at the time.

No surprise at all that only one person had heard of FIDE, in fact many on this forum might have expected FIDE to be pointless

[Geoff Chandler]

Hi Ian,

I know I yakker on about posters not using diagrams, yesterday I had a full blown tissy about the posters
at chessgames.com not using diagrams but posting an actual screen dump.........Well done sir.

(non of them at chessgames.com had the imagination to spell out " **** OFF "
using chess pieces on a diagram - I would have done.)

Mrs C. was close enough, although a complete non-player she knew the answer to all of them all except FIDE.
She even knew Deep Blue! I'm so glad Bobby was higher than Deep Blue.

On a side note, I sometimes use a an online spell checker when posting.
It knows Fischer, Kasparov and Karpov but not Carlsen, Anand or Topalov.

I have the Pointless Book - excellent read full of useless information.
The chapters start at 100 and works it's way backwards to number 1.

[John McKenna]

From The Telegraph
(By Katherine Rushton | Telegraph – Sat, May 17, 2014 21:25 BST)

Ken Rogoff warns China is next bubble to burst

The expert who predicted the US housing crisis fears slump of rival superpower
"Chess teaches you to think about what the other person is thinking. What do they want? What are they trying to do?” Kenneth Rogoff, the Harvard economist explains...


https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/ken-r ... 59495.html

[Stewart Reuben]

GM Ken Rogoff was educated for a bit in London as a teenager. I can't remember whether he won the Middlesex Closed Championship.
Don't confuse him with IM Ken Regan, who does much of the statistics on comparing moves played by humans with those chosen by computers.