Boris Spassky is the tenth world chess champion, title holder from 1969 to 1972. Spassky took part in three world championships: he lost to Tigran Petrosyan in 1966; defeated Petrosyan in 1969 to become world champion; then lost to Bobby Fischer in the famous 1972 match.
Boris Vasilievich Spassky was born on January 30, 1937 in Leningrad. He learned to play chess at the age of five during a train ride when his family was forced to evacuate from besieged Leningrad. And already at the age of ten he defeated the world champion Mikhail Botvinnik in a simultaneous game.
Chess career
In 1953, Spassky played in a tournament in Bucharest, Romania, and received the title of International Master. Two years later, he won the World Youth Chess Championship in Antwerp. At 18, he became the youngest candidate for the title of International Grandmaster.
In 1956, Spassky won the right to his first World Championship Candidates Tournament. However, he sacrificed it for his coursework at Leningrad University.
He won his first of two USSR championships in 1961 and was able to return to the candidates tournament again in 1965. In the chess world, he has developed a reputation as a versatile player, capable of both aggressive attacks and a long siege, patiently waiting for an opponent's mistake.
In 1966, Spassky could not claim the title of world champion, which at that time belonged to Tigran Petrosyan. With another chance three years later, he beat it to become the 10th world chess champion.
Spassky was chess king for three years until he was defeated by American Bobby Fischer in Reykjavik in 1972.
Spassky remained among the best players in the world for several years, winning the USSR Championship in 1973 and participating in several qualifying tournaments. At the same time, he settled in the suburbs of Paris with his third wife and became a French citizen in 1978.
By the end of the 1980s, Spassky could no longer play in the major league of world chess, his peers noted that he was trying to draw matches.
In 1992, he lost a highly publicized revenge against the hermit Fischer in Yugoslavia. Fischer already had problems with tax evasion; after his arrest in 2004, Spassky wrote a letter to US President George W. Bush, in which he said: “Bobby and I committed the same crimes. Impose sanctions on me, arrest me and put me in the same cell with Bobby Fischer. And give us a chess set."
Personal life
Boris has been married three times. His first wife (1959-1961) was Nadezhda Konstantinovna Latyntseva. Together they have one daughter, Tatiana (1960). His second wife was Larisa Zakharovna Solovyova. They gave birth to a son, Vasily Soloviev-Spassky (born in 1967). His third marriage happened in 1975 in France, Marina Yuryevna Shcherbacheva, the granddaughter of the White movement activist Dmitry Shcherbachev. They have a son, Boris Spassky Jr. (born in 1980).
His younger sister Iraida Spasskaya (born November 6, 1944) is a four-time champion of the USSR in Russian drafts and vice-champion of the world in international drafts (1974)
How he lives after 2000
On October 1, 2006, Spassky suffered a minor stroke during a chess lecture in San Francisco.
On March 27, 2010, at the age of 73, after the death of Vasily Smyslov, he became the oldest living former world chess champion.
On September 23, 2010, Boris suffered a second stroke, as a result of which he became paralyzed on the left side. After that, he went to France for a long rehabilitation.
On August 16, 2012, Spassky left France to return to Russia.
