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| Mar-19-06 | | ckr: <What the heck, may as well give Maurian's account> Maurian tells the following story of Lowenthal’s visit to New Orleans Picayune of January 17, 1909: <It was while Paul was at the height of his early reputation that Lowenthal, the Hungarian master, considered one of the greatest players of all time arrived in New Orleans. . .
Lowenthal’s reputation was such that the chess players of New Orleans planned to give him a great reception, and at the little club in the Third District the foreigner was royally entertained. He contested a number of strong players, and then it was then that Ernest Morphy told him of Paul’s skill and invited him to the Judge’s house to meet the lad.
Herr Lowenthal had heard of infant wonders before, and while he accepted the invitation to the Judge’s house he did not expect to find in Paul anything more than the usual juvenile chess genius. The Judge welcomed his guest, and after dinner the gentlemen repaired to the drawing-room for a game of chess. Herr Lowenthal saw little Paul and patted him on the head patronizingly and smiled as he entered the lists against the youngster. Herr Lowenthal, not wishing to take advantage of the boy, offered to give him odds, but judge Morphy and Mr. Ernest Morphy insisted that the visitor play Paul on even terms, and then if the lad was found easy, he might be given a handicap for the next game.
The battle began, and Paul, in no wise disturbed at the reputation of his opponent, played with his usual skill and confidence. The contest had not gone a dozen moves before Herr Lowenthal realized that he was up against the hardest proposition he had ever sought to solve. He first game was of no length, and to the surprise of everyone Paul won handily. Another game was played with similar result and a third also went the to the school boy.
Henceforth his reputation extended beyond the circle of relatives and friends, and if, prior to this encounter, there had been doubtful Thomases who had misgivings about his genius, they certainly disappeared now.
Such, indeed, was the confidence inspired by his victory over Lowenthal that certain gentlemen, with more enthusiasm than discretion, suggested to Judge Morphy the propriety his son to the International Chess Congress announced to take place in London in 1851. The practical father, however, refused to consider such a proposition, and instead of going to England, Paul Morphy in December 1850 entered college.> |
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Mar-19-06
 | | Sneaky: I know that Wikipedia is as dubious as the Muzio Gambit, but it may contain some clues: <Löwenthal played three games with Morphy during his New Orleans stay, losing all three. (Note: One of the games was incorrectly given as a draw in Löwenthal's book Morphy's Games of Chess and subsequently copied by sources since then. David Lawson, in his biography of Paul Morphy, listed in "Further Reading" at the bottom of this page, corrected this error, provided the moves that were actually played, and urged that game records be corrected.)> According to this, David Lawson's book contains the moves for this "missing third game" which was deemed unworthy of publication. Does anybody have this book? What is the score?? Also, it doesn't matter if Morphy didn't want to accept his third game as a win: if your opponent resigns you are the winner whether you like it or not. |
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| Mar-19-06 | | ckr: <Sneaky> The reference is to Lawson having the original manucript for the 2nd J Low-Morphy game (The Petroff) showing where J Low fudged the ending to make the result a draw rather than a loss for his publication. Since J Low's book was one of the most published and most complete Morphy collection several authors had copied the J-Low version. That is what Lawson was trying to get corrected. There is no score for the third game. You may want to get the MyMorphy.pgn, <SBC> is generous enough to host a page on her site making it available for all to download at http://batgirl.atspace.com/MyMorphy... , it is probably the most reliable source of Morphy's games and has had several contributions from many of the CG members here. AND what is so dubious about the Muzio?
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| Mar-19-06 | | capatal:
Alas, Morphy did not bother
to explain the superiority
of his method. Only the
powerful mind of another
chess giant, Wilhelm Steinitz,
could systematize the profound
positional rules that created
a new outlook in chess progress.
Garry Kasparov
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| Mar-19-06 | | capatal:
The magnificent American master
had the most extraordinary brain
that anybody has ever had for
chess, technique, strategy,
tactics, knowledge which is
inconceivable for us; all that
was possessed by Morphy fifty-
four years ago.
Jose R. Capablanca
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| Mar-19-06 | | capatal:
The man born too soon.
Alexander Alekhine ( on Morphy ) |
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| Mar-19-06 | | ckr: <Calli> Brooklyn Eagle on 9/25/1858
states:
< ...; and on the 22nd and 25th of May 1850 (not yet 13 years old) he
encountered the celebrated Hungarian, Herr Lowenthal, the result being,
in some measure, no doubt, owing to Mr Lowenthal's underrating his
young antagonist - Morphy 2, Lowenthal 0, Drawn 1>Maurian stated in 1862 that the third was also a loss. I think the 1 draw persisted due to J low's version. While I don't know how certain anyone can be without the third score I believe most agree there was no draw and it was 3-0. |
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| Mar-19-06 | | ckr: Perhaps the most accurate player who ever lived, he would beat anybody today in a set-match. He had complete sight of the board and seldom blundered even though he moved quite rapidly. I've played over hundreds of his games and am continually surprised and entertained by his ingenuity. <Bobby Fischer> |
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Mar-19-06
 | | BishopBerkeley: Vasily Smyslov : "There is no doubt that for Morphy chess was an art, and for chess Morphy was a great artist. His play was captivated by freshness of thought and inexhaustible energy. He played with inspiration, without striving to penetrate into the psychology of the opponent; he played, if one can express it so, 'pure chess'. His harmonious positional understanding and deep intuition would have made Morphy a highly dangerous opponent even for any player of our times." [ Garry Kasparov continues...] It would appear that each world champion considered Morphy's play through the prism of his own approach to chess. Each found in him the source of his own strength! And so, summing up all that has been said, Morphy can be regarded as the forefather of modern chess." - both passages from "On My Great Predecessors", vol. 1, page 44. [From page 32 of the same volume]:
"Paul was a real child prodigy: he astonished his family with his memory and with his quick grasp of everything. His play was distinguished by its inventiveness, precise calculation and the methodical implementation of his plans. And most important, gradually the young Morphy became the most erudite player of his time. Fluent in French, English, Spanish, and German, he read Philidor's 'L'analyse', the Parisian magazine 'La Régence', Staunton's 'Chess Player's Chronicle', and possibly also Anderssen's 'Schachzeitung', (at least, he knew all Anderssen's published games). He studied Bilguer's 400-page 'Handbuch' -- which consisted partly of opening analyses in tabular form, and also Staunton's 'Chess Player's Handbook'. 'These books,' considers [Bobby] Fischer, 'are better than modern ones; there has been no significant improvement since then in King Pawn openings, and Morphy's natural talents would be more than sufficient for him to vanquish the best twentieth century players.' " (: ♗ Bishop Berkeley ♗ :)
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| Mar-19-06 | | Calli: <ckr> Thanks for that. The best evidence, then, is that Löwenthal blundered in the first game and refused Morphy's offer of a "do over". If Löwenthal then resigned as Maurian relates, its obvious the score is 3-0. I don't think its an option for Morphy to refuse a resignation at that point and call it a draw. Only if Löwenthal wanted to continue that game but Morphy did not could you call the result something else. Its interesting that Morphy who undoubtedly could recall the score if he wanted to, kept it a secret and allowed it to be reported as a draw. Later he took his winnings from the 1858 match and bought furniture for Löwenthal. Still later, he did not protest when Löwenthal falsely published one of the other games as a draw. Apparently he felt kindly toward the older man and a draw in the 1850 match would help him "save face". |
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| Mar-19-06 | | historybuff: Game(c48)here,.... Although Morphy's famous sixth match game against Paulson has shown to have imperfections, its still played fearlessly, powerfully, and brilliantly. In his book "The Kings of Chess," William Hartston says of the famous queen sacrifice on move 17...Qxf3! Morphy thought for twelve minutes before offering his queen with this move - the longest time he spent on any single move in the whole New York tournament. Paulson cogitated much longer before capturing it. Some of the spectators were equally baffled. Mr Stanley, one of the bystanders, remarked of Mr Morphy, on making this seemingly rash move, that he should be confinded in a lunatic asylum.
A full eight moves later white can only prevent immediate mate by giving back his queen on move twenty-five.
Duration of the game, four hours. |
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| Mar-19-06 | | ckr: Señor <Calli> Non Problemo! The Eagle quote was so so so long ago I had forgotten it was in it. Consider it removed.
<historybuff> I am not 100% sure about this BUT I do believe that the particular move you mention in this game Paulsen vs Morphy, 1857 is the longest Morphy <ever> took for <any> move! <I think that is a 99.99% accurate statement.> |
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| Mar-19-06 | | historybuff: WOW, that is impressive, I can look at the board for hours and not find some of his moves! |
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| Mar-19-06 | | Calli: IIRC, the 12 minute max referred to all of Morphy's games during the tournament. I don't think it was a lifetime statistic. |
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| Mar-19-06 | | ckr: <Writing to the editor of 'The Good Companion Folder' very many years after
the first American Chess Congress, Professor C. F. Johnson of Hartford,
Connecticutt, says: "I remember somthing of the games between Morphy and
Paulsen ... Morphy once diliberated half an hour, when he sacrificed a
queen for a bishop, winning against Paulsen, and making what seems to me
the most profound move ever made over the board. I remember my indignation
when I pointed out to a friend that Morphy must have looked through seven
variations, none of them less than six moves deep, and my friend says 'He
never saw to the bottom of the lines, but he saw that the sacrifice would
embarrass Paulsen very much' The idea of Morphy making a sacrifice without
analysis is absurd." Hero-worship, such that which has survived so many
years, was the order of the day in New York after the Congress.>
- Sergeant 'Morphy Gleanings'
Should we give any credit to this account?
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| Mar-19-06 | | Calli: Probably not. Its like a famous sporting event where a million people claim to have been there in a stadium seating 60,000. Fiske specifies 12 minutes for Morphy on his 17th and 38 minutes for Paulsen on his 16th move as the two longest moves. They seem to be keeping time on each move of the games because of Paulsen's extraordinary time consumption. Fiske says not all moves were timed in this game, so evidently he had the timings up to a certain point, but didn't see the need to publish the rest. Lastest note on MyMorphy project - Sergeant(page 10) thinks the FH Lewis game is spurious. Doesn't exactly say why. |
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| Mar-19-06 | | ckr: <The sixth, the famous Queen Sacrifice game, was played on November 3, Paulsen having the move. In this game, as in most of the others, the elapsed time was recorded for some moves only. On his sixteenth move, Paulsen deliberated for thirty-eight minutes before moving. Morphy replied in less than five minutes, threatening mate in two moves. On his seventeenth move, Morphy took twelve minutes before offering his Queen for a Bishop (Morphy’s longest time on any move during the tournament), but Paulsen looked at Morphy’s Queen a log time before accepting it. Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper of November 288, 11857 gives the following account of this moment in the game: Mr. Stanley, one of the bystanders, remarked of Morphy, on making this seemingly rash move, that he should be confined in the lunatic Asylum. Not one present could fathom the meaning of this bold play, until move after move showed the wonderstruck spectators how accurate had been Mr. Morphy’s calculation … seeing into a dozen moves ahead with all attendant variations!> - Lawson - as usual the majority rules.
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| Mar-19-06 | | SBC: . Flies in the ointment's
what I call incongruity.
So I'll make my appointments
with my shrink in perpetuity.
So, why is forced mate a thing of beauty (to the 'mater, if not the matee), but forced rhyme a thing of dread? . Here's some flies in the ointment:
Thanks to <historybuff> we have this letter from D.W. Fiske to John G. White, March 14, 1901 which states: "He revised the sketch of himself in the Book of the First Chess Congress and selected the games for it." Now in the sketch of Morphy which Morphy himself assented to it says: p. 507 (by Daniel Willard Fiske)
"The crowning triumph, however, of the younger years of the American master was his defeat of Löwenthal. This distinguished Hungarian player, who had long before acquired a European reputation as a gifted cultivator of the art of Chess, was, like like his famous Chess-loving countryman, Grimm, driven into exile by the disastrous events which followed the heroic but unfortunate struggle of the Magyars against Austria. Coming to America, he visited New York and some of the western cities, and finally reached New Orleans in May, 1850. On the twenty-second and twenty-fifth of that month he played with Paul Morphy (at the time not yet thirteen years of age) in the presence of Mr. Rousseau, Mr. Ernest Morphy, and a large number of amateurs of New Orleans. The first game was a drawn one, but the second and third were won by the invincible young Philidor." In the same Book of the 1st American Congress, it says: pp. 394-5 (by John Jacob Löwenthal)
"On the 10th of May I left Cincinnati, and after spending two days at Louisville reached New Orleans on the 18th. On the 22d I delivered my letter of introduction to Mr. Rousseau, and was by him introduced to E. Morphy and several other amateurs. Matches were arranged between Mr. Rousseau, Mr. Morphy and me. On the 26th, I played with Mr. Rousseau (not match games) and won 5 games, all we played.
On the 27th I met Paul Morphy, then a youth, and played with him. I do not remember whether we played in all two or three games; one was drawn, the other or others I lost. The younger player appeared to me to possess Chess genius of a very high order. He showed great quickness of perception, and evinced brilliant strategical powers. When i passed through New York on my way to the great international tournament in London, I mentioned him to Mr. Stanley, and predicted for him a brilliant future." . It's all so incongruous.
NOTE: Löwenthal's book on Morphy Games (in which he altered the ending) came out after the Congress Book. |
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| Mar-19-06 | | ckr: <SBC> it is a good thing that Señor <Calli> has Scanned and OCR'ed that book. I hate to think that you pressed keys to post all that. <Calli> When can I exoect it? |
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| Mar-19-06 | | SBC: <BishopBerkeley>
hey!
concerning the quote from Kasparov, something struck me as amiss. I finally figured it out.: <Fluent in French, English, Spanish, and German, he read Philidor's 'L'analyse', the Parisian magazine 'La Régence', Staunton's 'Chess Player's Chronicle', and possibly also Anderssen's 'Schachzeitung', (at least, he knew all Anderssen's published games). He studied Bilguer's 400-page 'Handbuch' -- which consisted partly of opening analyses in tabular form...> Ernst Falkbeer was quite specific in mentioning (in 1881) that Morphy did NOT know German: "I was at the time editing the Chess Column of the London Sunday Times, and anxious to reproduce them there. In order to obtain the requisite information, I had to apply to one of the contesting parties. I first went to Morphy, who received me most cordially, and declared his entire willingness to dictate to me the last partie, played the day before. I begged him to repeat the game on the board, as I would, in this manner, be better able to follow the progress of the contest. Morphy consented, and, at the 10th move of black (Löwenthal), I asked him to stop a moment, since it seemed to me that at this particular point, a better move might have been made. "Oh, you probably mean the move which you yourself made in one of your contests with Drufresne?" answered Morphy in his simple, artless way of speaking. I was startled. The partie mentioned had been played in Berlin in 1851, seven years before, and I had totally forgotten all its details. On observing this, Morphy called for a second board, and began, without the least hesitation, to repeat that game from the first to the last move without making a single mistake. I was speechless from surprise. Here was a man, whose attention was consistantly distracted by countless demands on his memory, and yet he had perfectly retained for seven years all the details of a game insignificant in itself, and, moreover, printed in a language and and description unknown to him. (The game was published in the Berliner Schachzeitung of 1851!)" |
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| Mar-19-06 | | vesivialvy93: ok ....the match Staunton-Morphy has been played in other parallel world....what's the score i need your opinions...first to win 10 games ;
Morphy 10
Staunton 4 ....with 10 draws |
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| Mar-20-06 | | lblai: Staunton played two tournament games against Loewenthal in 1858, losing both of them. Also, there were the two consultation games that Staunton and Owen played against Morphy and Barnes. The Staunton and Owen team lost both of them. |
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| Mar-20-06 | | SBC: <ckr>
<it is a good thing that Señor <Calli> has Scanned and OCR'ed that book. I hate to think that you pressed keys to post all that.> Although I'm still waiting, rather impatiently I might add, for my copy of Señor <Calli> 's wonderful file, I was fortunate, or prescient, enough to have already had said text typed out: http://batgirl.atspace.com/Lowentha... |
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Mar-20-06
| | BishopBerkeley: <SBC> Thanks for this information! I suspect that even if Morphy did not know German he could get an awful lot out of German Chess publications. I really doubt that Morphy needed the commentary very much, just the moves! (I suspect he paid little heed to the commentary provided in languages that he DID know, since his immediate apprehension of the facts of different Chess positions was so great.) And the moves would be easy enough to figure out, allowing for the minimal notation differences between languages (e.g. the German "Springer" instead of the English "Knight", if that was the term used at that time.) I've often delighted in the fact that, at least in some ways, Chess functions as a language unto itself! It is the Esperanto of the game world, I think! On another subject, I stumbled upon this incidental parallel between our man Paul and another American "pride and sorrow": Jim Morrison of the rock group "The Doors": "On July 3, 1971 James Douglas [Jim] Morrison died in his bathtub under mysterious circumstances at twenty-seven years of age. The official coroner's report listed his cause of death as heart failure due to temperature changes caused by the hot bath he was taking...." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pamela...
More on Jim Morrison:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Mo...
♗ Bishop Berkeley ♗
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| Mar-20-06 | | ckr: <BishopBerkeley> Indeed that was a sad day. When I had first had heard of it, it was reported as a <drug overdose>. Jim Morrison, like Paul, was a man at the top. He also didn't agree with the public's perception of himself, being only appreciated for his music rather than his anarchist views. After his incarceration he left the music scene and this country. And while all these greats seem to be cashing in their chips in the bath tub, we are left with a legacy of songs and games from them both. I wonder if Jim Morrison play chess?
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