Mathwar/Personlist/Lasker Emanuel: Difference between revisions
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(* | (* December 24th 1868 in Berlinchen Poland, † January 11th 1941 in New York) | ||
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Latest revision as of 12:41, 15 July 2009
Emanuel Lasker
(* December 24th 1868 in Berlinchen Poland, † January 11th 1941 in New York)
Life
Lasker was an good Chess player he moved to the United States in 1902 and lived there until 1907 but only played in one chess tournament during these years, namely at Cambridge Springs in 1904. Lasker was second equal in this tournament, the winner Frank Marshall went on to challenge Lasker for the world championship. However, Lasker set high financial stakes for such a match and Marshall, young and comparatively unknown before the Cambridge Springs tournament, had little chance of finding backers to put up Lasker's asking price. Marshall had to take on other opponents which, indeed, he did.
In 1907 Lasker returned to Germany and, challenged again by Marshall, he now dropped the price to a figure that Marshall could find backers to put up - the World Champion was back to playing chess in a big way. During the years 1907 to 1910, he defended his World Champion's title in six matches, one against Marshall in 1907 in which Lasker never lost any of the 15 games played (8 wins and 7 draws), one match against Tarrasch in 1908, three matches against David Janowski in 1909 (two matches) and 1910, and one against Carl Schlechter in 1910. He only played in one tournament during these years, coming first equal with Akiba Rubinstein in St Petersburg in 1909. He also played exhibition matches, which could be lucrative, and in the same year he played two such matches against Janowski.
Lasker married Martha Cohn, the daughter of Emil Cohn, in 1911 and they lived in Berlin. Arrangements were put in place for Lasker to defend his title again. The plan was that he play Rubinstein for the World Championship, then that the winner would play José Raúl Capablanca. However, due to World War I, the matches could not be played. After World War I ended, arrangements were again worked out, with a world championship match between Lasker and Capablanca being set up. However, Lasker wrote to Capablanca resigning his World Champion title before the match was to be played. However, he was persuaded to play and the match took place in Havana, Cuba, in the following year. After fourteen games Lasker retired because of ill health and his reign of 27 years as World Chess Champion was over.
In spring 1933 Adolf Hitler started a campaign of discrimination and intimidation against Jews, depriving them of their property and citizenship. Lasker and his wife Martha, who were both Jews, were forced to leave Germany in the same year. After a short stay in England, in 1935 they were invited to live in the USSR by Nikolai Krylenko, the Commissar of Justice who was responsible for the Moscow show trials and, in his other capacity as Sports Minister, was an enthusiastic supporter of chess. In the USSR Lasker renounced his German citizenship and received Soviet citizenship. He took permanent residence in Moscow, and was given a post at Moscow's Institute for Mathematics and a post of trainer of the USSR national team. Lasker returned to competitive chess to make some money, finishing fifth in Zürich 1934 and third in Moscow 1935 sixth in Moscow 1936 and seventh equal in Nottingham 1936. His performance in Moscow 1935 at age 66 was hailed as "a biological miracle."