Chess Fireworks

For today's post I had planned to write about C.J.S.Purdy, but Fourth of July celebrations interfered. What to write about instead? When I need a quick post, a chess related image always comes in handy, so I set off searching Google images on the theme of 'chess fireworks'. Since no single image struck my fancy -- it happens frequently -- I fell back on the old standby, a composite image. This one shows the first few lines of results.

The upper left image, from a Chess.com page titled Alekhine fireworks on the land of volcanos, is more about fireworks than about chess, but the accompanying Alekhine game is about both. Many of the other images are related to the same theme: fireworks on the chess board.

The most intriguing image has to be the stockings on the bottom line. From Wallpaperpassion.com, it's titled Chess Shoe Wallpaper. Where are the fireworks? The page links to another page about 'sydney opera house fireworks wallpaper'. So that's a bust, but I still like the image.

Two of the images -- second line, fourth from the left & third line, second from the right -- are related. They are both from the page Marostica and chess.

Every even year the city of Marostica has a spectacular live chess match in their town square. The square is the chess board and people become the pieces for the match. The match was last year, and the weather was iffy…we weren’t sure if it was going to be a go. Then, the clouds disappeared and the sun came out and it was a perfect night for the chess match.

What about the fireworks? The image on the third line is captioned, 'The fireworks falling off the castle'.

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As for Purdy, that will have to wait for another time. I'll just mention that two titles -- 'C.J.S. Purdy: His Life, His Games and His Writings' (Belmont Printing Co., Melbourne, 1982) and 'The Search For Chess Perfection' (Thinkers Press / Chessco, 1997) -- are essentially the same work. The details are explained here: MY SEARCH FOR CHESS PERFECTION...COMING.