Nevertheless, Edna, as 老舍 (Lǎo Shě) says, “For myself? I love our country, but who loves me?”

Artwork © BipBeeBoo (@bipbeeboo)

Books She Hasn’t Read Yet

• Express News Service, “Why Aleksandra Goryachkina, who prioritized humanities over Maths, is Russia’s big hope to reclaim world title”, The Indian Express, March 26, 2026

In academics, too, the chess pro known for her Queen’s Gambit Declined (QGD) opening with Black, chose unconventionally. She would pass her state final exams prioritizing humanities over mathematics, which was unusual for chess players. [Read more].

Once again, Goryachkina is called to serve the empire. Photo: Chess Federation of Russia.

Above the Fray

• Express News Service, “What is 侯逸凡 (Hóu Yìfán), the greatest women’s chess player up to? ‘Making tenure as professor tougher than women’s World title!’ she jokes”, The Indian Express, March 26, 2026

Fans remembered her iconic hair clip when she would raze down entire fields to win world titles and when someone asked her where the famous accessory was, 逸凡 (Yìfán) would say, “This is definitely a friend asking this question. It’s probably at home in some boxes. I miss the clips too”. [Read more].

“If we are talking about women’s World championship, then becoming a tenured professor is tougher! But an open world title is much tougher”, 侯逸凡 (Hóu Yìfán) would quip. “By the way I’m still waiting on it”. Photo: Global Chess League.

All the World’s a Board

And so, Edna, to quote Byron’s own words, “There’s not a joy the world can give like that it takes away”

Artwork © AIFanSlaye

No, I’m not Byron

In an exclusive interview to Komsomolskaya Pravda, 12th World Chess Champion Anatoly Yevgenyevich Karpov opened the doors of his penthouse apartment and of his heart, sharing with the interviewers memories and secrets about his life.
The whole interview is permeated by a melancholic nostalgia for the golden times of the Soviet chess school, of which he, alongside with Mikhail Moiseyevich Botvinnik, was one of the most prominent ambassadors.
One of Karpov’s deepest regrets is that after the Soviet Union’s dissolution, the new Russian Federation was no longer so involved in funding the national chess machine, with the result that China and India can now claim the primacy of elite chess. “Our school has become practically extinct”, Karpov said. “The State is no longer involved, and if so only nominally”.
As a man from the Urals, he went a long way before getting to the chess throne, and owes much of his successes to his family. An exemplary Soviet family. “Yes, after all, both my father and mother were from working-class families. My father worked as a chief engineer at a major plant in Tula. And my father actually participated in the invention of the BM-21 Grad”, Karpov said. “He is also one of the inventors of antipersonnel ball-bombs. I remember him coming home one day with a grenade in hand. I asked what it was, and he said, ‘It’s a new ball-bomb. It will be used in Vietnam against the Americans’. It’s one of the inventions that inspired the Americans to end the Vietnam war”.
And finally, lastly, but not leastly, the sirens of the West sung to him, too. He was offered to leave the Soviet Union for a foreign land. When and where? “Well, I don’t remember. I remember it was at the 1974 Olympiad in France, when I was preparing for the match against Fischer”. Guess what his answer was. “I don’t even think about it”.

Karpov speaks out on his life and times. Photo: Ivan Igorevich Makeev/Komsomolskaya Pravda.

Legacies

Last But Not Least

“Good blood”, they say, “does not lie”. And indeed in 1911, Clarice Benini’s father participated in the historic National Tournament at Rome (the equivalent of an Italian Championship), in which he finished last with only 1 point out of 16. He won only one game, but it was a flash that illumined an otherwise shadowed biography, both for the name of the opponent and for the beauty of the combination.

Giuseppe Benini – Arturo Reggio
5th Congress USI; Rome, October 1911
French Defence C11

1. e4 e6 2. d4 d5 3. Nc3 Nf6 4. e5 Nfd7 5. Nf3 c5 6. Be3 cxd4 7. Bxd4 Nc6 8. Bb5 Be7 9. Qd2 0-0 10. Ne2 Qc7 11. c3 Ndxe5 12. Nxe5 Nxe5 13. f4 Nc6 14. 0-0 Nxd4 15. cxd4 Qb6 16. Bd3 f5 17. Kh1 Bf6 18. Rf3 Bxd4 19. Bxf5 Qxb2 20. Bxh7+ Kxh7 21. Qd3+ Kg8 22. Rb1 Qxa2 23. Nxd4 Qc4 24. Qe3 Rf6 25. g4 b6 26. g5 Rf7 27. Rc1 Qa4 28. Rh3 e5

A diagram to immortalise the Benini family! An asymmetrical situation, White is two Pawns down but enjoys a powerful attack.
29. g6! Rxf4? To paraphrase in reverse Alekhine — “What joy, to have your thinking and your fantasy carried high up by another person!”. Had Black played 29. ... Rc7!, White should have contented himself with 30. Re1!! (not 30. Rxc7? on account of 30. ... Bxh3 31. Qxh3 Qd1+ 32. Kg2 Qd2+ drawing by perpetual check) 30. ... Bxh3 31. Qxe5! Bg4! (the only move!) 32. Qxc7 Qd7 33. Qe5 retaining the initiative, but, of course, it would have been another story entirely.

In his column for La Lettura, Volume 31, 1931, p. 380, Giuseppe Padulli said, “After confidently playing 29. ... Rf7xf4, with his opponent to move, [Reggio] stood up and, walking around the hall, chatted with the others about his game; indeed, when one asked him if he was satisfied, he replied that everything seemed to be well in order: three Pawns won, and two enemy pieces threatened simultaneously, suggested a quick resolution in his favour. What was his surprise, however, when, returning to the table, he saw his opponent, Benini, play his move of rejoinder and, almost speaking to himself, say under his breath: — Mate in eight moves. So strong was the move Benini had found that it didn’t take Reggio too many minutes to comprehend the ensuing epilogue and resign himself to play forced moves until checkmate”.
30. Rh8+!! Kxh8 31. Rxc8+! Rxc8 32. Qh3+ Kg8 33. Qxc8+ Rf8 34. Qe6+ Kh8 35. Qh3+ Kg8 36. Qh7# 1–0.

A Handful of Flies

The staff and the hand

Giorgio Agamben, Quodlibet, March 16, 2026

“Shall the axe boast itself against him that heweth therewith? Or shall the saw magnify itself against him that moveth it? As if the rod moved them that lift it up, or as if the staff lifted itself up, and were not wood” (Isaiah, 10:15). The prophet’s words exactly describe what is happening today. Technological devices are the staff that claims to direct and in fact directs him who wields it or, rather, believes he wields it. And artificial intelligence appears at the moment in which man, now incapable of dominating the tools which he himself created, falls prey to what Günther Anders called Promethean shame and, by giving up thinking, submits to the staff that has slipped out from his hand.

(English translation by I, Robot)

Vasily Dmitrievich Polenov, Right hand, keeping the staff, ca. 1885. Courtesy of WikiArt.

Harmonic Healing

Catwoman Goes to the Opera

It was Sunday evening, and Aurora made her way up to the backstage of the Opera, posing for a Mado Flynn ad campaign for the A.M.A. (Friends of Animal World) Cat Pound.

Oh yes, Edna, at this rate they are going to self-destruct before the next war, hopefully

Artwork © Sky (@skyros_creations)

Dark Honey

Café Doney

Stefano Rosselli del Turco – Vittorio Volpi
1st Classification Tournament of Florence Chess Academy; Florence, 1899
French Defence C14

1. e4 e6 2. d4 d5 3. Nc3 Nf6 4. Bg5 Be7 5. e5 Nfd7 6. Bxe7 Qxe7 7. Nb5 Qb4+? A grave mistake. Already at that time, theory recommended either 7. ... Nb6 or 7. ... Qd8.
8. c3 Qa5 (8. ... Qxb2 9. Rb1+−)
9. Qd2. The Nuova Rivista degli Scacchi, Nos. 1-2, February 25, 1900, from where we took the present game (pp. 33–34), notes, with some reason, that “9. b4! Qb6 10. a4! at once was stronger”.
9. ... a6 10. Na3 c5 11. Nf3 cxd4 12. cxd4 Nc6 13. Nc2 Qxd2+ 14. Nxd2 f6 15. f4 0-0 16. Bd3 fxe5 17. fxe5 Rf4 18. Nf3 Nf8 19. 0-0 Ng6 20. Bxg6 hxg6 21. Nd2? A tactical slip, which luckily for Rosselli del Turco passes unnoticed. White should have first driven out the Black Rook with 21. g3.
21. ... Rxf1+? Black could have simply won a Pawn with 21. ... Nxd4! 22. Rxf4 Ne2+.
22. Rxf1 Bd7 23. Nf3 Rf8 24. Ng5 Rxf1+ 25. Kxf1 Ne7 26. g4 Kf8 27. Kf2 Ng8 28. Nb4 Nh6 29. Kg3 Nf7. “Black wasted so much time to come to exchange a Knight that was so useful to him!”, writes the commentator of the Nuova Rivista degli Scacchi. “This is an error of strategy!”.
30. Nxf7 Kxf7 31. Kf4 Bb5 32. Nc2 Bd3 33. Ne3 Be4? And this can well be called the losing move!

34. Nc4!+− dxc4 35. Kxe4 b5 36. d5 exd5+ 37. Kxd5 Ke7 38. a3! Kd7 39. Kc5 Ke6 40. Kb6 Kxe5 41. Kxa6 Kf4 42. Kxb5 Kxg4 43. a4 1–0.

Play Days

Searching for Spring

Visitors make their way through 西湖 (West Lake) park in 杭州 (Hángzhōu), 浙江省 (Zhèjiāng province), China. Photo: 新华社 (Xīnhuá News Agency)/Shutterstock.

Oh, you’re right, Edna; he’s no lord!

Artwork © Sky (@skyros_creations)

Lord Voldemort

Heads of state and murderers

Giorgio Agamben, Quodlibet, March 10, 2026

For the first time in history, we see the head of a self-proclaimed civilised state speaking openly like a murderer, saying of the religious leader of a country he assaulted: “we’re gonna kill him”, and of that country’s inhabitants: “we’ll massacre them”. Neither Hitler nor Stalin ever spoke like this. And yet, not only is this man not charged and deposed, but the heads of state of the so-called Western democracies approve of him, implicitly accepting that now politicians express themselves publicly as perhaps not even murderers dare to do among themselves.

(English translation by I, Robot)

Edvard Munch, The Murderer, 1910. Courtesy of WikiArt.

Hey, Edna, can you give us a ride?

Artwork © Sky (@skyros_creations)

E=mc²

Oh no, Edna, it is not yet clear who among Ben, Bibi and Don will turn out to be the ultimate winner

Artwork © Enya (@enya.draws4u)

On the Take

To be sure, Edna, it’s always sad to build a world no one will live in

Artwork © Kike Iturralde @kikecitox)

From Sham to Shame

Europe’s shame

Giorgio Agamben, Quodlibet, March 5, 2026

A country was attacked without any real reason and treacherously, while a sham negotiation was going on, and its spiritual head was murdered. European Union — i.e., that illegitimate organisation which bears such name — not only failed to condemn a blatant violation of international law, committed by two countries which appear to have lost all sense of self and responsibility, but also enjoined Iranian people to cease defending themselves.

(English translation by I, Robot)

A tryst in the woods ends in shame, in Edvard Munch’s painting Ashes (1894–5, detail). Credit: Heritage.

猫城记 (City of Cats)