Bobby Fischer Dies

[filkertom]

When I was growing up, I was something of a chess prodigy. Or at least I thought I was. Turned out I was just better than average. I remember a two-day tournament where, on the first day, I blasted through the competition, and apparently I was somewhichwayhow mathematically ranked as a master for a few hours, because that's all I faced on the second day and they put me in my place. It was a devastating, humbling experience, and probably one of the most important of my life, because it showed me that not only is there likely someone better than you, there's likely a lot of people better than you, so don't get too full of yourself.

Anyway. It was the perfect time to be a chess nut: 1972. Boris Spassky was the dirty lousy undeserving commie chess "champion", but we, the Good Guys, the U. S. of A.... we had Bobby Fischer. Who, it turns out, was not exactly hero material. But Godamighty the man could play chess.

Mr. Fischer has passed away at the age of 64. May he find the rest he never could while alive.

Who were your heroes when you were a kid? The ones who really influenced you? Mine were Doc Savage and Sherlock Holmes and Mr. Spock, but I never came close to achieving their emotional fortresses. (Thankfully, Mr. Fantastic showed me I didn't have to, and I could still get the girl.) Armstrong, Aldrin, and Collins, of course. You may not believe it, but Galen and Joseph Lister (I had a fantastic kid's biography of heroes of medicine). My school principal at the time of my tournament-chess days, Dr. Betty Ritzenhein. And then one year, tenth grade, everything changed: I heard the works of Cosby and Carlin, and I picked up books by two guys named Asimov and Ellison, and dubheach told me about this other guy named Tolkien....

Comments

[joshuwain.livejournal.com]

It will sound odd, but as a child -at least as the child I can still remember- my heroes were the (to be expected) Superman and, a few years later, Alfred Hitchcock. Sure, I loved the astronauts I saw on TV and the fictional hero Jupiter Jones (of the Three Investigators fame) probably drove me in the direction of the fabled director, but I actually researched and wrote papers about Mr. Hitchcock. When he died, shortly after making "Family Plot", I was really devastated. I didn't have another big "hero" for a long, long time. Julia Child was one of those, in the end.

Does that make sense?

As a side-note, tell me, did the portrayal of Mister Fantastic in "Civil War" leave you cold?

[filkertom.livejournal.com]

The entirety of Marvel Comics over the past several years, with the exception of JMS's work on Thor, has left me cold. For that matter, so has most of DC's output. Thank FSM for the DCAU (DC Animated Universe).

[joshuwain.livejournal.com]

I know what you mean.

Oh, sure, there has been the Vertigo comic "Fables" but most of my childhood (and teenage and young adult) heroes have been kinda warped beyond recognition, y'know?

Anyway, I wonder if continuing to have heroes would help.

When I look at the world, today, I keep thinking of people like Al Gore or Neal Armstrong, but my list runs a bit short. Perhaps it's a side-effect of age rather than a paucity of people to believe in?

[filkertom.livejournal.com]

Fables is fantastic -- I have to get that collected. But there are heroes, both real and fictional, to be had. Maybe we'll have that thread later.

[autographedcat.livejournal.com]

Here's some good reading that I got permission to re-run in Aphelion a few years ago:

The Importance of Heroes by Tony Isabella

[sdelmonte]

And for all those cheap b&w reprints of Silver Age comics for those of us who missed it the first time. Jack and Stan are still there, waiting for me to pay a visit.

Hmmm. Stan Lee , come to think of it, was almost a hero to me. I sure as heck identified him with all that's good in the world when I was 10.