Fischer's interest in Polina Khropov
From the memoirs of Mark
Taimanov
| Katerina, a friend of mine,
bought the memoirs of Taimanov, recently published in Russia. She was
so nice to translate the part where Fischer meets Polina Khropov, the
daughter of the president of Saint-Petersburg chess federation, in
Budapest. The handheld TV, Fischer always carries around with him, gets
also mentioned by Petra
Dautov. She described a Panasonic handheld TV, Fischer buys
in Germany. When Fischer discovers a defect, a small black spot nobody
else sees, he moves heaven and earth to get the set replaced. Finally,
when the TV is send to Japan, he gets a new one. According to Petra, he
then even buys a second handheld, to compare the
two.
Yesterday we visited the Exhibition of non-fiction books in Moscow Artist House. I saw a new book of Mark Taimanov memoirs, looked through the pages and decided to buy it. Taimanov is a very interesting person, talented both in chess and music. He traveled all over the world and met a lot of people. There is also a chapter, devoted to Fischer. In 1996 Andre Liliental celebrated his 85th anniversary and many Russian grandmasters were invited. Liliental planned to ask his closest friends home, but Fischer did not like the list of guests and did not come, in spite of Liliental disappointment with his refusal. |
At the time Fischer was interested in a Russian girl, Polina (the daughter of the president of Saint-Petersburg chess federation, Boris Khropov) and wanted to meet her. Polina was attractive but her English was much to be desired and Taimanov's wife Nadya agreed to be an interpreter for Fischer during one of his dates. Nadya described Fischer as a huge bearded guy, in spite of the summer heat wearing a thick flannel skirt, a leather vest, a cap, shabby jeans, sandals and keeping two huge bags in his hands. Could it be Fischer?!
"Are you Nadia?" said Bobby in English. "And where is Polina? Is she coming soon?" On the other side of the boulevard they saw a bench in a shade and decided to go there. "But there is no crossing here," -he objected. "The street is empty, no traffic here...", said Nadya. "No, it won't do!" cut Bobby and they went far away to the light signal. "Do you play chess?" he asked and took a chess set from his bag. Nadya did not and the famous chess player was disappointed but there were some other topics for conversation. Fischer took a handheld TV from the other bag and asked: "Would you like to watch anything? It's a new model; you can even catch Russian channels". It took a few minutes. Some dogs passed by. "Do you know what kind of dog it is?" "It's a dog". "But I am asking about the kind..." "A dog", Nadya repeated. In English "a dog" means any dog and in Russian it was a definite kind of dog and she could not do anything with that. But in this moment Polina came and the talk got more official. Later when Fischer called in Petersburg he warned Polina in Russian "Zavtra Nada" implying that he wanted Nadya's help to translate the talks.
| It is interesting that Taimanov says nothing about Fischer's anti-Semitic views and his notorious 9/11 interview. The only interview he mentioned was the one given in Iceland in 2002. It is remarkable how Taimanov avoids Fischer's controversial statements. |
Fischer talked about politics, about violation of his civil rights in the USA but mainly, of course, about chess. When a reporter asked him about the match with the champion of Iceland, Fischer agreed at once, saying though that it should be Fischer random chess, as he does not play old chess anymore. "And for 10 millions of dollars" "Even for 10 millions I won't play old chess." In addition, answering the question if he enjoyed life in Japan Fischer said, "Better here than in American prison.