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Chessville
Advertise to Single insert:
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with Taylor
Kingston
For the past several years, Taylor Kingston has been a frequent contributor
to chess literature, as a reviewer, reporter, analyst, author of historical
articles, and book editor. His book credits include Heroic Tales:
The Best of ChessCafe.com 1996-2001, which he edited and
co-wrote, and The Life and Games of Carlos Torre by Gabriel Velasco,
which he translated from Spanish. An avid student of chess history,
his historical articles have appeared in Chess Life, Inside Chess,
Kingpin, and Chess Horizons, and his many book reviews at
www.chesscafe.com have earned him a reputation for both fairness and
stern candor. He has ranked among USCF’s top 50 correspondence
masters, and is a Class A OTB player. A native of San Diego,
California (born 1949), Kingston now lives in Vermont with his wife and two
daughters, and works as a computer programmer in the banking industry.
Chessville: So what prompted you to start chess writing initially, as an activity on its own merit, or towards some other goal, and after some 100 columns for Chess Cafe is your sense of your motivation the same as when you started? Taylor Kingston: Primarily I just enjoy writing for its own sake. Chess is an interesting subject, both the game and the people involved with it. An early inspiration, back in the 1970s, was Elliott Dobbins, TD at a club in San Diego, California, who produced delightful, witty weekly tournament recaps. I first got published about 20 years ago, when a few of my correspondence games appeared in USCF’s short-lived Postal Chess Bulletin. Later I annotated games for club newsletters, eventually expanding into book reviews, history, humor, etc. When some of this work caught the eye of Hanon Russell (ChessCafe.com), Mike Franett (Inside Chess) and other higher-level editors, I was invited to contribute, “hitting the big time” (in a small way). Motivation can vary depending on the topic. A book one is assigned to review can be dull or interesting. If it’s dull, I write to warn potential buyers. With an interesting book, or a topic of my own choosing, I write because I find it interesting, and I want to share what I’ve found.
Chessville: And after 100 columns writing about chess, what
really cheeses you off about it? With chess literature, the continuing low wheat-to-chaff ratio is depressing. Was it Polugaevsky who said that 90% of chess books might as well not have been written? It’s still true, and it’s depressing to see the work of prolific hacks, and worse than hacks, push good writers off the retail shelves. Though in that regard I’m not sure chess is any worse off than, say, paperback fiction. There is some improvement, for example McFarland & Co. turn out some marvelous books the likes of which one seldom saw decades ago.
Chessville: What’s the most enjoyable piece you have
written, and why does it feel so? Of historical articles, some biographical sketches of Spielmann, Janowski, Paulsen, Winawer, Mieses and Saemisch for Inside Chess were enjoyable, for what I learned about them in the process of research. It seemed like they came alive in my mind, to some extent. In terms of larger projects, I greatly enjoyed translating Gabriel Velasco’s The Life and Games of Carlos Torre from Spanish, and working with him to produce a revised, expanded English edition. What I most enjoy now is the annual International Chess Calendar, which I have edited several years running for Russell Enterprises. Researching chess history from 25, 50, 75 and 100 years ago, month by month, and choosing games and personalities to highlight, is great fun for a bookworm. Likewise the annual ChessCafe trivia quiz, much of which I write — there are some very well-informed readers out there, and trying to stump them is an interesting challenge.
Chessville: Do you have a preference of type of material to
comment upon?
Chessville: When you read public newsgroups, do you think
people are (a) very well informed by them (b) generally partially informed,
or (c) there is a mishmash of misleading material written by less than
studied enthusiasts? Still, I put my two cents worth in now and then, either trying to answer sincere questions or counteract some of the misinformers. It would be nice if there were a chess.history group, where the more serious-minded might converse without the mud-slingers.
Chessville: Do you feel fairly rewarded for your writing in
a financial sense? That is, do you ever think you get more than
minimum wage? I can’t say chess has been financially disappointing, because I never entertained high expectations. And being financially independent of chess has certain advantages — I can review objectively, I never need to shill for any author or publisher, and I can wait to have something worth saying rather than be forced to churn out hackwork just to pay last month’s rent.
Chessville: Could you identify one from the one hundred
columns you have written as being significantly more important in some way
than the others?
Chessville: Tell us about a good squabble with an editor. It stemmed originally from my first Keres-Botvinnik article, which was critical of Evans. His friend Parr came to his defense. Things intensified during a dispute between Evans and historian Edward Winter, in which I supported Winter. Parr and Evans misrepresented and distorted various things I said. I do not tolerate that well. Charges and counter-charges flew so thick and fast in the letters section of Chess Life that then-editor Peter Kurzdorfer finally put a muzzle on the whole thing. A truce seems to have prevailed since then.
Chessville: I believe you are an expert level player — do
you feel privileged or deprived in writing for your market as a result of
your chess rating? Rating has little bearing on my writing, except that I try to be careful not to meddle where Elo strength and GM wisdom matter. I would never presume, say, to challenge Anand’s opinion on the Sicilian or Benko’s on an endgame, or to write an instructive book. However, rating is irrelevant to historical matters, and most of the instructive books I’ve reviewed are aimed at players of my strength or below. When an analytical issue is too great for my own powers, I consult Mr. Fritz, or a GM friend, as when Karsten Mueller helped with my article “The Turk’s Endgames.” Rather than deprived, I have always felt privileged to do what I have in chess, a subject where Elo often does matter. The non-GM definitely has a part to play, but he must be careful to find his proper niche.
Chessville: To what extent does national chess politics
impact chess writing?
Chessville: Now and again you have addressed international
chess issues in your writing, particularly concerning Botvinnik and
Soviet-era manipulations. What is it like researching this material,
and can you characterize your own level of confidence in the result? My own researches were frustrating and tantalizing, a process of winnowing through vast amounts of opinion to get a few kernels of fact, trying to deduce from those as full a picture as possible, getting at best a partial outline. In the matter of Keres and Botvinnik, I feel confident that some sort of official pressure, express or implied, adversely affected Keres in 1948, but the specific form that pressure took may never be known. And my case is not so strong that it cannot be overturned by new evidence.
Chessville: Okay! What was the worst goof you made as a
journalist? What did you learn by the experience? The other was a positive review I gave at ChessCafe.com of John Emms’ The Most Amazing Chess Moves of All Time (Gambit 2000). Since his intro mentioned the Dutch writer Tim Krabbé as a source, I assumed that Emms had Krabbé’s permission to use the many items taken from his outstanding “Chess Curiosities” web-site. To my chagrin, a week or two later Richard Forster, in his own ChessCafe column, sharply panned the book and published a statement by Krabbé that Emms had plundered his work, which took years to collect, without so much as a “by your leave.” I felt that my failure to check this out, which I could have done easily by contacting Krabbé, was significant enough that I put a public apology in the ChessCafe Bulletin Board. One review contained a minor gaffe that sticks in my mind. I faulted Paul Motwani for the phrase “vice-like grip.” In American spelling, “vise” meaning a clamp, is distinct from “vice” meaning sin. However, the British (Motwani’s from Scotland) spell both “vice,” a fact not pointed out by the inadequate dictionary I consulted. I have since learned to be more cognizant of Brit/Yank differences. So, I guess the lesson here is, don’t rush to a conclusion without first checking the facts — and get a good dictionary.
Chessville: What was the greatest coup in a journalistic sense? Now and then in historical research one can uncover some forgotten fact that puts something in a new light, maybe overturns an old assumption. For example, some believe that Morphy’s contemporary, Louis Paulsen, was such a slow player that he couldn’t cope with clocks after they were introduced circa 1870. Yet, reading the tournament book of Leipzig 1877, probably Paulsen’s greatest triumph, I found that there was a TL of 20 moves per hour. So much for Paulsen’s slowness.
Chessville: To what extent are you influenced by levels of
feedback to your writing? So many chess reviews are so superficial, seemingly written by people with no time or inclination for careful examination. I take the job seriously, evaluating thoroughly from many angles, which depending on the book could include chess analysis, quality of games, breadth or depth of research, historical accuracy, organization, composition, originality, style, grammar, spelling, fluency of translation, print layout, physical appearance, and other factors. What is surprising (or perhaps not) about some feedback, is how readers who jump on a chess book’s analytical errors like dogs on red meat, will casually excuse almost any other sort of flaw, and furthermore deride reviewers who note them as snobs, elitists, nitpickers, etc. It’s as if they like crap, and resent anyone who doesn’t. For them I recommend Eric Schiller. Newsgroup feedback is sometimes absurd. For example, someone on rgcm wrote that by changing my mind about Evans’ “Tragedy of Keres” article, I had violated the touch-move rule. As if such a thing applied to research! At that rate we’d still have to think the sun orbited the earth. Some authors and publishers I’ve panned have claimed that I had some ulterior motive. For example, Don Schultz charged that I panned his Fischer, Kasparov, and the Others for political reasons. Referring to the dreadful Bobby Fischer: From Chess Genius to Legend, Bob Long of Thinker’s Press claimed I like to pan his books, though he offered no reason, and ignored the fact that I have panned only that one but recommended two highly. No, the plain fact is that those are bad books, and my duty required me to say so. I gained nothing by saying so, except that I kept my self-respect. Long’s full response proved to be positively juvenile. Though he has written that he is “trying to avoid … the gossip and tattle telling — an area chess is rife with such attitudes” [sic], he has posted on his web-site various bits of gossip about me, all false. One must develop a thick skin toward this sort of thing. On the other hand, some authors and publishers have responded to constructive criticism very graciously. For example, Sid Pickard has made corrections to various e-books and CDs based some of my comments. John Hilbert, whose skill as a writer is perhaps not quite equal to his skill as an historian, has never failed to thank me when I suggest improvements to his style. And some real chess pros, both writers and players, have praised my work, Ken Whyld, Bernard Cafferty, Hans Ree, Burt Hochberg, Mark Dvoretsky, Yasser Seirawan, Jeremy Silman, John Watson among them. That has been very gratifying. And I am open to correction of my own errors. Some readers, notably Dennis Monokroussos, have pointed out the occasional analytical mistake. In one review I referred to seven levels of hell in Dante’s Inferno; a literate reader pointed out that there were actually nine. In such cases I try to get a correction made ASAP, although the flawed original usually remains in the ChessCafe archives, an indelible record of my sins.
Chessville: Which question haven’t I asked yet that you
would have liked to reply to, and what do you say to yourself about this
self-posed question?
Chessville: What next in chess? In two years I want
to … ?
Chessville: What is the biggest surprise or revelation
about the chess scene that you have discovered by virtue of being immersed
in chess — something that you had not sufficiently appreciated before? The second was seeing how strong is the chess world’s tendency to internal strife. At every level, from local clubs up through national and international organizations, one sees schism, infighting, pettiness, egotism, hyper-sensitivity, mismanagement, malfeasance, etc. Does the fact that chess is a game of ego and ambition, where paranoia is a realistic outlook and success depends on mercilessly punishing mistakes, foster all this? Does the game attract people with these tendencies? I don’t know, but the current anarchy and corruption almost make one pine for the old days of Soviet hegemony, when at least there was some order. Chessville: What advice would you offer someone in writing about chess, in a similar way as you have done yourself, principally as an e-journalist? TK:
The above are set forth as ideals, which aside from the last I haven’t always lived up to myself.
Chessville: What chess material do you read outside of any
business or vocational interest?
Chessville: What do you think of chess culture in the USA
compared with chess in Europe? Would the fact of being a European have
changed your own involvement in the game, do you think?
Chessville: What from your perspective do you see as the
single most important factor for encouraging chess culture in the USA? We’ve seen things inching toward that with the recent marketing of WGM Alexandra Kosteniuk as a sex object. What a joke. In promoting chess, I personally would emphasize the game itself, its beauty, its intricacy, its rich history, its intellectual challenge, making it as attractive as possible to the intelligent minority who find that interesting. And I’d probably go broke quickly. But seriously, anyone entertaining dreams of making chess as popular in America as it is in, say, Russia or Iceland, is “trying to whip farts out of a dead mule,” to use Bill Parcells’ colorful phrase. Let us accept our minority subculture status, and do the best we can within that framework. Despite the majority’s anti-intellectualism, our population is big and varied enough, our environment rich enough, that we will still produce the occasional Morphy, Pillsbury, Fine or Fischer.
Chessville: If you were the editor of Chess Life magazine,
as a print, or a print and web entity, what significant changes would you
make to the current editorial mix of columns and means of presentation? I can offer no overall prescription. One feature I would like to see back in the magazine is a proper international news section. A 1960s Chess Review gave a decent idea of what was going on in the world each month: results of major, sometimes even minor tournaments, national championships from Iceland to Australia, that sort of thing. With chess being played more widely now, that’s even more important, but CL has nothing of the sort. Maybe the current management assumes everybody gets it all from the Internet, but as a history buff I bemoan the lack of a printed record. For my
probably esoteric taste, the best magazine I’ve seen recently is Karl,
a German quarterly subtitled Das Kulturelle Schachmagazin. It
emphasizes history, but also does a decent job with current international,
or at least European, chess. I doubt such a magazine could survive in
the American market unless subsidized.
Index of Other 20-Questions Interviews
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