Colin Simpson, who has died after a long illness at the age of 69, was a star both at the bridge table and away from it. I vividly remember first meeting him when I started playing rubber bridge at TGRs about 20 years ago. He was tall, with a commanding presence, and despite playing for
Every so often a game is played which is worthy of joining the immortals in the pantheon of chessboard masterpieces. Anderssen v. Kieseritsky, London 1851, Zukertort v. Blackburne, London 1883, Botvinnik v. Capablanca, AVRO 1938; these are the jewels to which every chess player aspires. As Marcel Duchamp once observed: ‘not all artists are chess
In Competition No. 3040 you were invited to submit a poem against poets or poetry. Plato started it, but over the ages poetry has been accused of many sins: elitism, aestheticising horror, inadequacy as an agency of political change. In what was a wide-ranging and spirited entry there were references to Shelley (‘poets are
Unclued lights form three sets of three, each set related in a different way to a theme-word which is hidden in the grid and should be highlighted. Across 1 Keeping on certain subject, I am an unusual scientist (13) 9 A court’s brief shade (4) 14 Mount paintings an artist submitted (6) 15 In
‘Now is the woodcock near the gin’, said by Fabian in Twelfth Night, suggests the position of BECASSE in relation to 8, 21, 28, 30 and 37. First prize Jenny Staveley, London SW2 Runners-up Andrew Bell, Shrewsbury, Shropshire; A.M. Dymond, London SE24
Black to play. This position is a variation from today’s game Aronian-Kramnik, Berlin 2018. How can Black briskly conclude his kingside attack? Answers to me at The Spectator by Tuesday 27 February or via email to victoria@spectator.co.uk. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include a
