The Meaning of !? and ?!
Continuing with Fischer - Keres, Zurich 1959, Keres played 38...f4 in the diagrammed position. Fischer gave the move a '!?' and noted,
A risky selection in time pressure, aimed against 39.Kd3?? Bf5+. On 38...Be6 39.Rc6 is strong. Best is simply 38...Kf6 39.Ra7 (not 39.f4 Be6 40.Rc6? Rg7 41.Kf2 Rxg2+!) 39...Bc8 40.Rxf7+ Kxf7=
Kasparov copied this analysis and added,
After missing a certain draw, Keres is not yet losing the game, but he simply loses a Pawn.
This is straightforward enough, except that Kasparov assigned '?!' to Keres' 38...f4.
Zurich 1959
Keres, Paul
Fischer, Robert
(After 38.Kf2-e2)
[FEN "8/2Rb1rkp/p2p4/1p3p2/3p4/5P1P/PP2K1P1/1B6 b - - 0 38"]
Informant defines '!?' as 'a move deserving attention' and '?!' as 'a dubious move'. This means that Fischer's use of '!?' does not conform to current practice. I like to think of '!?' as halfway between a neutral no comment and '!', while '?!' is between neutral and '?'.
This leads to two questions: Assuming that Fischer's use of notation is consistent, in what circumstances did he apply '!?' and '?!' to other moves in his book? When did Informant's definition become standard practice?
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1 comment:
I alwasy thought !? meant 'interesting' and I suppose by definition interesting moves deserve attention :)
Maybe it was precisely interesting because it involved taking a risk in time-trouble!? And likewise, maybe there's no contradiction with Kasparov's notation if objectively the is move dubious as well?!
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