Summer Lecture Series Announced

Chess Indeed's man-on-the-street Sir Robin of the Redwoods informs us that the Summer Lecture Series has finally been announced at the Snails Corners Chess Club in exotic Sheboygan, Wisconsin--and it looks like a doozy of a lineup!

Alvin Becker, renowned meteorologist and a strong "weak expert," will be discussing the following topics for anyone with enough stamina to sit still for four hours at a stretch:



International Master Captain Caveman will be
giving a simul during the lectures, making it even
harder for Becker to hold his audience's attention.



1. World championship games Alekhine obviously played while drunk

2. Bobby Fischer's 60 Memorable Anti-Semitic Rants

3. How to Avoid Fool's Mate--even if you're a fool



4. The ten shortest chessplayers of all time (surprisingly, the midget inside "the Turk" is only #3)



5. How to hypnotize your opponents using a large, hand-cranked spiral-generating device



6. A move-by-move analysis of Steinitz-God, Baden-Baden 1898

7. Chess is different from Checkers--here's how

8. Is Ivanchuk insane? A peek into the mind of a bewildered man

9. Fire on board: how to unobtrusively ignite a chessboard when you're losing

10. A look at the Ostrich Counter-Defense (1...Nh6 2...Ng8!?)



As usual, I will have a front-row seat for these lectures (by which I mean I'll be safe in my plush Boston hovel, one ear cocked vaguely toward Sheboygan as the other thrills to the dulcet crooning of Lionel Richie).

Unusual Tactics: Smothers Brothers Mate

Today Chess Indeed launches an exciting new series, Unusual Tactics, in which we spotlight rare tactical motifs and try and come up with ridiculous names for them.

Today we look at what seems (at first glance) to be an ordinary run-of-the-mill Smothered Mate.

Every woodpusher knows the correct mating technique here: knight discovers double-check on h3, queen sham-sacs on g1, knight "seals the coffin" on f2, and everyone's home in time to watch Matlock.

But in this particular case, g1 is guarded twice, which means the usual method won't work. A second knight is needed (the "brother" of the first knight, if you will) to finish the job: 1...Nh3+ 2.Kh1 Qg1+ 3.Ng1 Nhf2+ 4.Rf2 Nf2#.

Since the first knight needed his brother's help to complete the smothering, the obvious name for this mate is the Smothers Brothers Mate--and I hereby claim credit for this absurd moniker, should it ever find its way into one of the more disreputable chess tomes of, say, GM Raymond "the Penguin" Keene.

Next week: the Porky Pig