The game of chess with its history goes far into the past. With each generation, her technique gained new nuances, especially with the advent and development of computers. Despite all this, the old generation grandmasters are still strong and able to repel any attack.
Biography of Mark Taimanov
The future chess player was born in early 1926, in February, in the city of Kharkov. After some time, the family moved to Leningrad. It is in this city that Mark Evgenievich Taimanov, as a child, enters a chess school. His first teacher, who influenced Mark’s game, was Mikhail Botvinnik. In the young chess player, professionals noticed the ability to play and predicted a great future for him.
At an early age, young Taimanov showed his talent and ability to calculate options for moves and strategies. He entered the chess school at the age of 11, combining it with lessons at the conservatory. Passion for music soon grew into a professional activity. Mark Evgenievich Taimanov toured extensively around the country and abroad with concerts and recorded several records.
He never conducted his concert activity in parallel with chess tournaments, but alternated them. He himself said that during the championships he rested from music, and during concerts - from chess. “You can say that I have a rest all my life,” the grandmaster jokes.
Victories and defeats
The first success in the intellectual game can be considered the second place in the 1952 USSR championship, when the young beginner chess player lost the lead to Botvinnik. Further, his career in this field grew, and in 1956 he already became the champion of the country. He was invited to the competition, called in mentors.
The career of a grandmaster is associated not only with victories and successes. So, in 1971, he was “lucky” to meet the great Bobby Fischer at the chessboard in the quarter-finals, which took place in Canada. The game ended in a complete fiasco for Taimanov, and after losing the championship, he fell into disgrace from government officials who decided that such a result of the match was a betrayal of the Soviet chess player. For many years after this, Mark Evgenievich could not tour and perform, all doors were closed for him, until 1991.
Personal life
Mark Evgenievich Taimanov met his first wife at the conservatory with the light hand of their common teacher - Savshinsky Samaria Ilyich. For a long time, they played a duet on the piano, and after a while, the relations of young people turned into romantic ones. From his first marriage, Mark Evgenievich had a son who went in the musical footsteps of his father and also entered the conservatory.
Taimanov Mark Evgenievich, whose personal life was recently discussed in the media, got married a second time. His chosen one is Nadezhda, and she is 35 years younger than her husband. Nevertheless, the age difference did not affect the creation of a happy family. In 2004, the Taimanovs had twins: a boy and a girl.
The great chess player tries all his time to devote to his family and parenting in St. Petersburg. Taimanov Mark Evgenievich, wife Nadezhda and his children often go for a walk together. The great chess player met his wife by chance when his friend, a doctor by profession, came to visit him. Hope was his patient. Mark Evgenievich liked the girl immediately, and after a while he realized that this was fate.
Achievements
Mark Evgenievich Taimanov is a versatile person, and chess was not his only hobby. In childhood, as already mentioned, he began to study music and continued his studies at the conservatory, which he successfully graduated from. For a long time he successfully performed with tours in different countries both as a solo pianist and in a duet with his wife. Also at the age of 11, he starred in the movie “Beethoven Concert”.
Chess player Taimanov is a multiple winner of various tournaments and the author of several books, one of which he wrote after his famous defeat - "I was a victim of Fisher." In addition, throughout his life, Mark Evgenievich was familiar and talked with prominent political figures, film and theater actors, musicians and other celebrities. He outlined his impressions and thoughts in the book “Remembering the most-most.”
In addition to chess, literary and concert activities, Mark Taimanov was engaged in journalism. His articles were published in newspapers and magazines, and he himself was invited to competitions and championships.