S2 E22 Jeremy Silman v J. MacFarland (1991)

Passing away in late 2023, International Master Jeremy Silman made a lasting impact on our game through his playing, his consulting, his writing, and his coaching. 

Born in 1954, Silman didn’t start playing chess until he was 12 where he went to his first tournament, ending with a rating of 1068. 

In high school, Silman expressed to his guidance counselor that he wanted to go to “Moscow University” to study chess from the best players of the Soviet Union. Considering this was in the middle of the Cold War, this was not really an option. 

Instead, he joined the Army but he lasted less than 3 months before being discharged and going to San Francisco in 1973. Two years later at the age of 20, earned his Master title. 

The next couple of years, his US Chess Rating began to grow. 2400 in 1980. 2500 in 1981 where he tied for first at the US Open. He hit his peak US Chess rating of 2556 in 1982. 

He met his future wife in 1988 and after 2 months of dating asked her to marry him. In an interview with the New York Times, Ms Feldman said she was unsure because the life of a chess player can be unstable, so she said she would marry him only if he fulfilled the requirements to become an International Master. 

Later in the year, he earned his final IM norm - shortly thereafter he and his wife got married. 

In 1990, he was the winner of the National Open. Two years later, he was the winner of the American Open. Silman reached his peak rating in 1995 when he reached a 2420 rating. 

He never had an interest in trying to achieve his Grandmaster title. His last tournament was in 1999, but by that point, he’d started to phase himself out of tournaments instead focusing on his writing and his coaching.

He was a coach of the US Junior National Team as well as a columnist for Chess Life, New In Chess, and Chess.com. According to Chess.com, he wrote 481 articles for the website.

Silman went on to write a total of 39 books selling over 600,000 copies including - Reassess Your Chess, Silman’s Complete Endgame Manual, The Amateur’s Mind, and The Complete Book of Chess Strategy. His success was predominantly in the United States, but his book has now been translated into French and German. 

Not only that, but he was also a chess consultant on high profile shows like - Criminal Minds, Arliss, Monk, Malcolm in the Middle, and Harry Potter (though he is uncredited for his puzzle in the Harry Potter movie).

Unfortunately, Silman passed away in September of 2023 at the age of 69 from a form of dementia. 

Through his works and education, Jeremy Silman helped influence hundreds of thousands of chess players.  Reassess Your Chess was given to me as one of my first chess books I’ve read and Silman’s Complete Endgame Course was one of the first endgame books I enjoyed. 

In today’s game we are going back to 1991 to the Reno Open. 

Jeremy Silman versus James MacFarland. 

Now, if we’re ready - let’s begin. 

1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.g3 d5 4.Nf3 Be7 5.Bg2 O-O 6.Nbd2 Nbd7 7.O-O c6 8.Qc2 b6 9.e4 dxe4 10.Nxe4 Bb7 11.Bf4 Nxe4 12.Qxe4 Nf6 13.Qe2 Bd6 14.Ne5 Bxe5 15.dxe5 Nd7 16.Rfd1 Qe7 17.Rd6 Rac8 18.Rad1 Nb8 19.Qg4 Kh8 20.Bg5 Qc7 21.Be4 c5 22.Bxb7 Qxb7 23.Bf6 1-0

https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1124892

https://www.chess.com/news/view/jeremy-silman-1954-2023

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/26/books/jeremy-silman-dead.html 

http://cassidynoble.com/