Michael Ehn

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Michael Ehn (born September 2, 1960 in Vienna ) is an Austrian bookseller and chess historian .

Life

Michael Ehn grew up in a small farmer environment with his grandparents in Burgenland . He studied at the University of Vienna , where he presented his diploma thesis in 1986 on the life stories of social deviants . In 1989, the publishing house of the Austrian Academy of Sciences published his book Deviating Life Stories ISBN 3-7001-1581-4 , which is based on narrative interviews with tramps.

As early as the mid-1990s, Ehn owned one of the world's largest collections of chess literature with 12,000 historical volumes . He runs the bookstore Schach und Spiele, which emerged from the Wiener Schachverlag in Vienna, and is considered one of the leading chess historians in German-speaking countries. From 1992 to 1994 he headed a research project on “Chess and Anti-Semitism in Vienna 1900–1950” and from 1994 to 1999 a research project on Austrian chess history. In 1996, together with Ernst Strouhal , he organized the exhibition A Song of Reason at the Jewish Museum Vienna .

Publications

Ehn published books on the grandmasters Ernst Grünfeld (1993, ISBN 3-9500291-0-9 ) and Rudolf Spielmann (1996, ISBN 3-929291-04-5 ). Together with Ernst Strouhal, he published a book about chess life in Vienna between 1700 and 1938 under the title Luftmenschen ISBN 3-85449-141-7 .

In 1997 Ehn published under the title Joy of Chess. 50 games by a chess lover an annotated collection of 50 games by the Austrian player Ewald Riedl. In open tournaments in the USA, Riedl was classified as a Class E player, which corresponds to an Elo number between 1000 and 1200. Therefore this book is to be seen as a unique piece of chess literature . In the foreword, Ehn explained that Riedl was a “very common hobby player” and that the book was to be understood as a “plea for popular chess”.

Since 1990 he has worked on the weekly chess column for the daily newspaper Der Standard . He also wrote articles on chess history for the magazines New In Chess and Karl . To the 1995 anthology published by the vizier to Lady ISBN 3-901505-04-0 he steered the essay The great reform (S. 51 ff.) In in which he deals with the change in the rules of movement for the lady of the second half Employed 15th century. Together with Ernst Strouhal he published the article Aufstieg und Elend des Wiener Schachleben in the magazine Menora (1996, pp. 194-220) . On a hidden history of everyday life and anti-Semitism as well as in the anthology Emanuel Lasker. Homo ludens, homo politicus (2003, ISBN 3-935035-15-2 ) the article Memory and Fantasy. Emanuel Lasker's culturalist view of the relationship between Judaism and the game of chess and their limits (pp. 161–172).

In 2010, together with Hugo Kastner, Ehn published the book Everything about chess: Myths, curiosities, superlatives ISBN 978-3-86910-171-2 . Furthermore, Ehn published together with Ernst Strouhal in 2010 on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the above. Column the work en passant ISBN 978-3-7091-0345-6 . In spring 2017, Geniales Schach was published in the Viennese coffee house 1750–1918 ISBN 978-3-902494-80-1 .

literature

  • Harald Steiner: On "Jewish" and "Aryan" chess. A Viennese researches the past of the Austrian chess sport. In: Chess Report . No. 1, 1996, pp. 72-73.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Harald Steiner: On "Jewish" and "Aryan" chess. A Viennese researches the past of the Austrian chess sport. In: Schach-Report , No. 1, 1996, pp. 72-73.
  2. ^ New In Chess ( Memento from July 4, 2008 in the Internet Archive )
personal data
SURNAME Ehn, Michael
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian bookseller and chess historian
DATE OF BIRTH 2nd September 1960
PLACE OF BIRTH Vienna