Andor Lilienthal

Andor Lilienthal, 1936
Association	Hungary (until 1939, from 1976) Soviet Union (1939 to 1976)
Born	May 5, 1911 Moscow
Died	May 8, 2010 Budapest
title	Grand Master (1950)
Best Elo rating	2450 (July 1971)

Andor Lilienthal [ ɒndor liljɛntaːl ] ( Russian Андрэ (Андрей) Арнольдович Лилиенталь ., Scientific transliteration André (Andrei) Arnol'dovič Liliental ' , also French André Lilienthal; * 5. May 1911 in Moscow , † 8. May 2010 in Budapest ) was a Hungarian chess player who was a Soviet citizen from 1939 .

Life

Andor Lilienthal's mother was a Hungarian singer who had been engaged on a Moscow stage since 1909. His father was a Hungarian electrical engineer . Lilienthal was born as the third child in the family. His brother was born in Budapest in 1907 , his sister in Moscow in 1909. In December 1913 the mother and the children returned to Budapest, the father stayed in Russia and was taken prisoner after the First World War . Lilienthal had to spend the materially difficult time during and after the war in a children's home . His mother had lost her voice due to illness and, having become penniless, gave her children state care. There the boy learned the tailoring trade .

As a 15-year-old trained tailor who could not find a job, Lilienthal learned chess . Soon after, he was spending all of his time in the Budapest cafes, gambling for money. In 1929 he went to Vienna to visit his father. He also did not fail to visit the chess cafés there, where he met ex-world champion José Raúl Capablanca for the first time , who gave a simultaneous performance. Lilienthal reached a draw against him . Otherwise he managed to earn enough money in the cafes that he could finance a trip to Berlin . In Berlin, too, he spent a lot of time in the cafés there and made a name for himself as a strong player. His next stop was Paris in 1930 . His good results in the local chess cafés were followed by an invitation to his first international tournament, held in Paris. Lilienthal achieved 4 points from 7 games on his debut and shared places 4 and 5.

In the years that followed, he took part in a number of important tournaments , his best period being the 1930s and 1940s. At the turn of 1934/1935 in Hastings , he defeated Capablanca in a sensational game. He played for Hungary at three Chess Olympiads : 1933 in Folkestone (10 out of 13), 1935 in Warsaw (15 out of 19) and 1937 in Stockholm (12 out of 17). During the Moscow tournament of 1935 he met a Russian named Yevgenia, who soon became his wife. The couple had lived in Moscow since then, and Lilienthal received Soviet citizenship in 1939.

Andor Lilienthal at the 2006 Chess Olympiad in Turin

Since 1937 he took part in the championships of the USSR . In 1938 he became champion of Belarus (out of competition) . In 1940 he won the Moscow championship, at the USSR championship in Moscow in 1940 he shared first place with Igor Bondarewski and Vasily Smyslow . The Second World War prevented him from fully exploiting its potential chess. With a 5th place at the Interzonal Tournament in Saltsjöbaden in 1948 he qualified for the Candidates Tournament in Budapest in 1950, where he came in 8th place. In the 1950s he began a coaching career and worked with Tigran Petrosyan from 1951 to 1963 . He himself only played a few tournaments during this time. He achieved a good result at a tournament in Moscow in 1962, where he took 3rd place, shared with Gedeon Barcza and Dawid Bronstein . In 1976, after the death of his wife, Lilienthal returned to Budapest. He married twice more, first the Russian Lyudmila and in 1987 the Russian Olga.

His vivid memory of Emanuel Lasker , who was in exile in Moscow in the 1930s and was cared for by Lilienthal, was presented with charm and freshness in 2001 on the occasion of the first congress of the Emanuel Lasker Society in Potsdam.

His best historical rating was 2710. He reached it in 1934. At that time he was the sixth best player in the world. Due to his international success, he was one of the first players to receive the title of Grandmaster from FIDE in 1950 . On his 85th birthday, FIDE President Kirsan Ilyumschinov awarded him a lifetime pension of $ 750 a month for his services to the game of chess .

Game example

Lilienthal – Capablanca

	a	b	c	d	e	f	G	H
8th									8th
7th									7th
6th									6th
5									5
4th									4th
3									3
2									2
1									1
	a	b	c	d	e	f	G	H

Position after 19.… Qc4xe4

Lilienthal played his most famous game at the 1934/35 Hastings tournament against Capablanca, in which he defeated the former world champion in just 26 moves after a spectacular queen sacrifice .

Lilienthal – Capablanca 1-0

Hastings, January 1, 1935

Nimzowitsch-Indian Defense , E24

1. d2 – d4 Ng8 – f6 2. c2 – c4 e7 – e6 3. Nb1 – c3 Bf8 – b4 4. a2 – a3 Bb4xc3 + 5. b2xc3 b7 – b6 6. f2 – f3 d7 – d5 7. Bc1 – g5 h7 –H6 8. Bg5 – h4 Bc8 – a6 9. e2 – e4 La6xc4 10. Bf1xc4 d5xc4 11. Qd1 – a4 + Qd8 – d7 12. Qa4xc4 Qd7 – c6 13. Qc4 – d3 Nb8 – d7 14. Ng1 – e2 Ra8 – d8 15. 0–0 a7 – a5 16. Qd3 – c2 Qc6 – c4 17. f3 – f4 Rd8 – c8 18. f4 – f5 e6 – e5 19. d4xe5 Qc4xe4 diagram 20. e5xf6 Qe4xc2 21. f6xg7 Rh8 – g8 22. Ne2 -D4 Qc2-e4 23. Ra1-e1 Nd7-c5 24. Re1xe4 + Nc5xe4 25. Rf1-e1 Rg8xg7 26. Re1xe4 + Ke8-d7 1: 0

literature

• A. Lilienthal: Chess was my life (Hungarian original title: Életem, a sakk , translated by Árpád Földeák). Harry Deutsch Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1988, ISBN 3-8171-1048-0 .

Web links

Commons : Andor Lilienthal  - Collection of Images

• Literature by and about Andor Lilienthal in the catalog of the German National Library
• For the 94th birthday on chessbase.de
• Interview with Lilienthal (Russian)
• Replayable chess games by Andor Lilienthal on 365Chess.com (English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Andrej Lilienthal turns 95 In: de.chessbase.com. May 5, 2006, accessed November 15, 2019.
2. ↑ Grandmaster Andor Lilienthal dies at 99 On: chessbase.com (English)
3. ↑ Willy Iclicki: FIDE Golden book 1924-2002 . Euroadria, Slovenia, 2002, p. 74.