Bobby Fischer Quotations

There isn't a woman player in the world I can't give knights-odds to and still beat.

Now my only income is a few royalty cheques from my books.

All that matters on the Chessboard is good moves

I don't remember one thing I learned in school.

I hate ready-made suits, button-down collars, and sports shirts.

When I won the world championship, in 1972, the United States had an image of, you know, a football country, a baseball country, but nobody thought of it as an intellectual country.

I like the moment when I break a man's ego.

There are too many Jews in chess. They seem to have taken away the class of the game. They don't seem to dress so nicely. That's what I don't like.

Nothing is so healing as the human touch.

I felt that chess... is a science in the form of a game... I consider myself a scientist. I wanted to be treated like a scientist.

All I want to do, ever, is play chess.

Chess and me, it's hard to take them apart. It's like my alter ego.

America is totally under control of the Jews, you know. I mean, look what they're doing in Yugoslavia.

I was never invited to the White House. They invited that Olympic Russian gymnast - that little Communist, Olga Korbut.

The white people should go back to Europe, and the country should be returned to the American Indians. This is the future I would like to see for the so-called United States.

Ultimately the white man should leave the United States and the black people should go back to Africa.

I consider myself to be a genius who happens to play chess.

I hope the Icelandic government grants me political asylum.

I don't want to look like a bum.

I was never invited to the White House.

Nobody has single-handedly done more for the U.S. than me.

I usually never stay at the board after a game. Especially against Spassky. I made a dumb suggestion and he refuted it instantly! I know I'm going to have to play him some day and it was really stupid to look like such a jerk in front of him.

When I win, I'll put my title on the line every year, maybe even twice. I'll give players a chance to beat me.

I don't believe in hero worship.

Teach people to play new chess, right away. Why do you offer them a black and white television set, when there is a set in color?

They're all weak, all women. They're stupid compared to men. They shouldn't play chess, you know. They're like beginners. They lose every single game against a man. There isn't a woman player in the world I can't give knight-odds to and still beat.

Americans like a winner. If you lose, you're nothing. I'm going to win, though. It's good for the match that Spassky has a plus score against me. We've met five times. He's won three times and we've drawn twice. But I'm a stronger player and a long match favors me.

Yeah, there are too many Jews in chess. They seem to have taken away the class of the game. They don't seem to dress so nicely, you know. That's what I don't like.

Vacations are designed to refresh the outlook of everyone. No matter how tired they may be when they return to work, vacationers have been refreshed emotionally and intellectually. Their effectiveness in their job has probably improved, and they are, generally speaking, better employees for the time off.

I have nothing to do with politics. I came here [Yugoslavia] to play chess and nothing else.

The old chess is too limited. Imagine playing cards, black jack for example, and every time the dealer has the same starting hand you have the same starting hand. What's the point?

Nothing eases suffering like human touch.

Alekhine developed as a player much more slowly than most. In his twenties, he was an atrocious chessplayer, and didn't mature until he was well into his thirties.

I play honestly and I play to win. If I lose, I take my medicine.

Well, I kind of split my life into two pieces. One was where my chess career lies. There, I kept my sanity, so to speak, and my logic. And the other was my religious life. I tried to apply what I learned in the church to my chess career too. But I still was studying chess. I wasn't just "trusting in God" to give me the moves.

FIDE has decided against my participation in the 1975 World Chess Champion title.

There's no one alive I can't beat.

You are never too old to play chess!

People have been playing against me below their strength for fifteen years.

Let's play. I'm willing to play anywhere.

I'm not afraid of Spassky. The world knows I'm the best. You don't need a match to prove it.

If you have seen one Alekhine game you've seen them all.

The Russians have fixed world chess.

I really love the dark of the night. It helps me to concentrate.

I don't care! I don't have to show anybody my games just because they're a big shot!

Genius. It's a word. What does it really mean? If I win I'm a genius. If I don't, I'm not.

I don't keep any close friends. I don't keep any secrets. I don't need friends. I just tell everybody everything, that's all.

I was in Japan a couple of months ago, I saw a preview for the movie Pearl Harbor. And they showed the Japanese airplanes coming in to bomb Pearl Harbor, and I applauded. Nobody else in the theater applauded.

I don't believe in psychology. I believe in good moves

Yeah, I used to dress badly until I was about sixteen. But people just didn't seem to have enough respect for me, you know And I didn't like that, so I decided I'd have to show them they weren't any better than me, you know? They were sort of priding themselves. They would say, 'He beat us at chess, but he's still just an uncouth kid.' So I decided to dress up.

I object to being called a chess genius, because I consider myself to be an all around genius, who just happens to play chess, which is rather different. A piece of garbage like Kasparov might be called a chess genius, but he is like an idiot savant, outside of chess he knows nothing.

Chess is war over the board. The object is to crush the opponents mind.

In chess so much depends on opening theory, so the champions before the last century did not know as much as I do and other players do about opening theory. So if you just brought them back from the dead they wouldn't do well. They'd get bad openings.

I am not today, nor have I ever been a Jew, and as a matter of fact, I am uncircumcised.

The United States is an illegitimate country, just like Israel. It has no right to exist. That country belongs to the Red man, the American Indian... It's actually a shame to be a so-called American, because everybody living there is a usurper, an invader taking part in this crime, which is to rob the land, rob the country and kill all the American Indians.

I studied that first Karpov-Kasparov match for a year and a half before I cracked it, what they were doing, and discovered that it was all prearranged move-by-move. There's no doubt of it in my mind.

You can only get good at Chess if you love the game

I could give any woman in the world a piece and a move; to Gaprindashvili even, a knight.

My main interest right now is to expose the Jews. This is a lot bigger than me. They're not just persecuting me. This is not just my struggle, I'm not just doing this for myself... This is life and death for the world. These God-damn Jews have to be stopped. They're a menace to the whole world.

Morphy was probably the greatest genius of them all

Psychologically, you have to have confidence in yourself and this confidence should be based on fact.

She and I just don't see eye to eye together. She's a square. She keeps telling me that I'm too interested in chess, that I should get friends outside of chess, you can't make a living from chess, that I should finish high school and all that nonsense. She keeps in my hair and I don't like people in my hair, you know, so I had to get rid of her.

I give 98 percent of my mental energy to Chess Others give only 2 percent

When I used to go to the Manhattan Chess Club back in the fifties, I met a lot of old-timers there who knew Capablanca, because he used to come around to the Manhattan club in the forties - before he died in the early forties. They spoke about Capablanca with awe. I have never seen people speak about any chess player like that, before or since.

Most people are sheep, and they need the support of others.

I love chess, and I didnt invent Fischerandom chess to destroy chess. I invented Fischerandom chess to keep chess going. Because I consider the old chess is dying, or really its dead. A lot of people have come up with other rules of chess-type games, with 10x8 boards, new pieces, and all kinds of things. Im really not interested in that. I want to keep the old chess flavour. I want to keep the old chess game. But just making a change so the starting positions are mixed, so its not degenerated down to memorisation and prearrangement like it is today.

Capablanca was among the greatest of chess players, but not because of his endgame. His trick was to keep his openings simple, and then play with such brilliance in the middlegame that the game was decided - even though his ooponent didn't always know it - before they arrived at the ending.

The turning point in my career came with the realization that Black should play to win instead of just steering for equality.

I think it's almost definite that the game is a draw theoretically.

My opponents make good moves too. Sometimes I don't take these things into consideration

Chess demands total concentration

As Olafsson showed me, White can win... It's hard to believe. I stayed up all night analysing, finally convicing myself, and, incidentally, learning a lot about Rook and Pawn endings in the process.

Concentrate on material gains. Whatever your opponent gives you take, unless you see a good reason not to.

I don't recommend trying to cram a lot of long opening-move variations into your head. The main idea behind any opening is to get a strong pawn center and give your pieces a lot of scope so that you cramp your opponent's position and can attack weaknesses in his game.

If I win a tournament, I win it by myself. I do the playing. Nobody helps me

Blitz chess kills your ideas.

I read a book lately by Nietzsche and he says religion is just to dull the senses of the people. I agree.

I don't listen to weakies.

The U.S. and Israel have been slaughtering the Palestinians, just slaughtering them, for years. Robbing them and slaughtering them.

I don't like American girls. They're very conceited, you know. In Europe they're more pleasant.

I like to make them squirm.

It's the fault of the chess players themselves. I don't know what they used to be, but now they're not the most gentlemanly group. When it was a game played by the aristocrats it had more like you know dignity to it. When they used to have the clubs, like no women were allowed and everybody went in dressed in a suit, a tie, like gentlemen, you know. Now, kids come running in their sneakers. Even in the best chess club-and they got women in there. It's a social place and people are making noise, it's a madhouse.

Karpov, Kasparov, Korchnoi have absolutely destroyed chess by their immoral, unethical, prearranged games. These guys are really the lowest dogs around, and if people knew the truth about them, they would be held in more contempt than Ben Johnson, the runner, and they're going to know the truth when I do this book!

I add status to any tournament I attend.

They're lying bastards. Jews were always lying bastards throughout their history. They're a filthy, dirty, disgusting, vile, criminal people.

Patzer sees a check, gives a check.

Well, you know, in America everybody is interested in making the dollar fast. In Yugoslavia no matter how much you hustle you're not going to get rich, so you might as well play chess.

Your body has to be in top condition. Your Chess deteriorates as your body does. You can't separate body from mind

That's what Chess is all about. One day you give your opponent a lesson, the next day he gives you one

I would rather be free in my mind, and be locked up in a prison cell, than to be a coward and not be able to say what I want.

I am the best player in the world and I am here to prove it

Chess is like war on a board

A strong memory, concentration, imagination, and a strong will is required to become a great Chess player

But the thing that was great about Capablanca was that he really spoke his mind, he said what he believed was true, he said what he felt. He wanted to change the rules [of chess] already, back in the twenties, because he said chess was getting played out. He was right. Now chess is completely dead. It is all just memorisation and prearrangement. It's a terrible game now. Very uncreative.

I don't believe in psychology.

You have to have the fighting spirit. You have to force moves and take chances

There are tough players and nice guys, and I'm a tough player

I grew up with the concept of freedom of speech. So I'm too old, it's too late for me to adjust to the new world, the new world order.

Tactics flow from a superior position

First of all, we have to understand what communism is. I mean, to me, real communism, the Soviet communism, is basically a mask for Bolshevism, which is a mask for Judaism.