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2 unusual facts about Mikhail Tal


Bernard Cafferty

He has produced translations of Botvinnik's Best Games 1947-70 and the Soviet world champion's autobiography (Achieving the Aim) as well as collections of the best games of Mikhail Tal and Boris Spassky.

Vladimir Vysotsky

Just several months later Riga-based chess grandmaster Mikhail Tal was heard praising the author of "Bolshoy Karetny" (Большой Каретный) and Anna Akhmatova (in a conversation with Joseph Brodsky) was quoting Vysotsky's number "I was the soul of a bad company..." taking it apparently for some brilliant piece of anonymous street folklore.


Arno Nickel

From 1991 until 1994 he edited the "Schach-Journal" together with Alexander Koblencs, former trainer of Mikhail Tal.

István Csom

Over the course of his career, Csom defeated many top Grandmasters, including Ulf Andersson, Boris Gulko, Tony Miles, Lajos Portisch, Samuel Reshevsky, Nigel Short, former World Champion Mikhail Tal, Rafael Vaganian, and Arthur Yussupov.

Robert Hübner

At his strongest in the mid-seventies to early eighties, Hübner participated in many of the elite tournaments of the day, such as Tilburg 1978 and Montreal 1979 (The Tournament of Stars), playing alongside Anatoly Karpov, Mikhail Tal, and Jan Timman.

Two Knights Defense

The Two Knights has been adopted as Black by many aggressive players including Mikhail Chigorin and Paul Keres, and World Champions Mikhail Tal and Boris Spassky.


see also