Wilhelm Steinitz
"...I cannot imagine anything that puts such a
strain on all the vital organs - brain, heart, kidneys and liver - at once,
as the excitement when playing chess..."
World Champion 1886-1894
Born: 1836, Prague
Died: 1900, New York
For Steinitz chess was a science. Positional
laws could be identified and learned. He didn't believe in creativity or
intuition. There were only hypotheses
and proofs. He was concerned with the development
of his pieces, strong and weak squares,
control of the center, good
and bad bishops, pawn structure and other such positional
considerations. Steinitz came up with the profound idea that if you have
a positional advantage
you must attack or risk losing the advantage. After defeating Andersson
in a match in 1866, Steinitz announced to the world that he was World Champion.
Steinitz was "officially" recognized as World Champion in 1886 when he
won the first World Championship match ever to be held, against Johann
Zukertort of Poland. Steinitz lost his World Championship title to Lasker
in 1894. After a poor performance in London in 1899, Steinitz went insane
and died a year later.
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