Biography
By the late 1950s, Gufeld established himself as one of the strongest players in the world. He defeated Mikhail Tal, Boris Spassky, Vasily Smyslov, Viktor Korchnoi, David Bronstein, and just about every other strong Soviet player.
Gufeld played in his first chess tournament in 1953 at the age of 17. He became the junior champion of Ukraine at the age of 18. He became an International Master in 1964, and became an International Grandmaster in 1967. In 1977 his Elo rating was 2570, and ranked 16th in the world.
He was also a trainer who moved to Tbilisi, the Republic of Georgia, and lived there for more than a decade, and coached Maia Chiburdanidze, who became the youngest women's world chess champion in 1978.
After the fall of the Soviet Union, he emigrated to the United States.
He started the FIDE Committee on Chess Art and Exhibition.
He used to say to those who laughed at his English: "I think that my English is better than your Russian!"
Gufeld was one of most prolific authors in all of chess, writing over 100 chess books, which sold 3.5 million copies worldwide.
His proudest achievements, however, were his win with the King's Indian Defence, Sämisch Variation against Vladimir Bagirov, which he called his "Mona Lisa," and his 1967 win over Vasily Smyslov (see below). The first of these games made it into John Nunn's collection of the hundred greatest games of all time, Mammoth Book of the World's Greatest Chess Games, and the 112-game collection that followed it. Gufeld beat Smyslov again in 1975.
In September 2002, Gufeld suffered a stroke and heart attack virtually simultaneously. Following a period of unconsciousness, he regained consciousness but was unable to speak or walk. He died two weeks later at the age of 66 in the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. He is interred in the Hollywood Forever Cemetery in Hollywood, CA.
Read more about this topic: Eduard Gufeld
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