Talk:List of chess players

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Contents 1 Old talk 2 Country of Origin 3 Wikilinks 4 Female players 5 "Notable" 6 Who is Richard Urwand? 7 Verifiability 8 The original names (in their own languages) 9 Separate section for women? 10 Edgar Allan Poe

[edit] Old talk

I removed some names from the list of "famous" chess players because these names do not have any special significance in the history of chess (or in some cases, not yet, since some of the players are still active GM's). There are literally hundreds of Grandmasters, many of them rated above 2600; just a strong rating should not qualify them in this list. Also, some of the entries were just ridiculous.

I don't see how any of them were ridiculous - who do you think was ridiculous? This page can serve as an index of articles about chess players. Yes, we might eventually have articles on hundreds of chess players, but that's OK, we can list them all here. If we start getting selective, we have to come up with criteria as to who to include and who not to include, and I don't see how we're going to do that (I mean, when you edited, you took out Leko (who is currently world number ten and one of the world's best known players), but left in Bruno Parma (who I guess most people have never heard of)). It's better to just list whoever we have an article on. --Camembert

(I think that removing the opening stuff about "famous" players was a good idea, by the way) --Camembert

Hello! I added a few players (a couple of US and Canadian champions, and Irving Chernev :), but I was wondering how the country associated with each player was being standardized. Place of birth? Country they played for/in regularly? For example, Chessbase's database apppears to use the country they played for/in. Also, having read the previous, I have to agree with Camembert - why not include all the players you can? If you want to impose criteria (like titled players only?) or split the pages, that's something to do in the future, isn't it? -- Khamsin 05:53, 18 Apr 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Country of Origin

Is Shirov a Spanish citizen now? ChessPlayer 01:09, 15 May 2004 (UTC)

I can't say for sure if he's a citizen of the country (though I think he his), but he certainly plays for Spain, and is listed as Spanish in the FIDE rating list. --Camembert

He has settled there, married a Spaniard and adopted Spanish nationality... Calexico (Talk) 13:01, 17 May 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Wikilinks

I hadn't noticed the inconsistent wikilinking until the bot-assisted change of a link halfway through. Currently, most of the country names aren't wikilinked, but a few are. The consistent policies would be: (1) link each country the first time it appears; or (2) don't link any of them. I favor #2 because anyone wanting more information about a player's origin will click on the link to that player's article, rather than go to the country article to look at its flag or whatever. JamesMLane 04:01, 12 Jul 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Female players

Is there a good reason for listing notable female players separately? When the page was created [1] there were only fourteen names in total (including four women). Now that the male list has expanded so much, it looks a bit odd to have the two sections; on the other hand, I can see that it's important to recognise "women in chess" in some way. I'd like to merge the lists, but I'm not sure how best to avoid information loss - how should the female entries be marked, if at all? Perhaps it's worth creating Women in chess to cover the topic directly, and just list players here without any special marking. Thanks in advance for comments. --AlexG 21:20, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I can't think of a good reason for listing female players separately. The two reasons I can think of seem fairly feeble. First, one might argue that strong female chess players are notably merely for their rarity. But there are other classes (e.g. strong chess players from Indonesia, strong chess players who are black) which have relatively few representatives, and don't get extra attention for that reason. Second, one might argue that women deserve greater recognition for playing chess well than men get for reaching the same level. This seems patronizing to me. We have separate competitions for women and men in things like the 100-meter dash, because men are on average bigger and stronger than women. If we draw distinctions in chess it implies that men are, on average, smarter than women, or at least better able to play chess. I vigorously oppose any explicit statement thus condescending to women, and would prefer not to do anything (such as maintaining two lists) which carries the same implication.

I fervently hope that Judit Polgar (or some other woman) will win the World Championship some day so that having a Women's World Championship will become obsolete. In the mean time, I support merging the female players into the main list of chess players.

Peace, --Fritzlein 22:19, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I prefer AlexG's suggestion, which is, as I understand it: (1) have a list that includes all notable players, and (2) have a separate list that includes only the notable women. It's not for Wikipedia to judge whether this division is patronizing. The objective fact is that FIDE doesn't run a separate championship for blacks but does run one for women. Given the existence of women's events, as well as the historical preponderance of men at the top ranks of chess players, it's foreseeable that some readers would have an interest in seeing a list that pulled out the women from the main list. JamesMLane 06:08, 17 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Having looked around a bit more, it seems there's already quite a bit of material at World Chess Championship about the separate women's competition and players' attitudes to that. (And it also includes a list of female winners, which largely overlaps with the list here.) So for now, I've just merged the lists at this article; if anyone has anything more to say about women in chess, they can use the WCC article as a basis. --AlexG 19:39, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

[edit] "Notable"

The word notable can be interpreted in many different ways. Surely we should have a concrete definition for who qualifies? Ludraman 14:20, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Who is Richard Urwand?

I removed Richard Urwand (Egypt, France, 1914–2006) without prejudice against putting him back in if someone can demonstrate he was a notable chess player. Richard Urwand is a redlink, a google search was unproductive except for wikipedia mirrors, no Urwand games are found at http://chessgames.com, and there are no Urwand games in my Fritz/Chessbase database. 71.82.170.150 06:33, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Verifiability

I would suggest to add external links for red-linked names (like I did for Abram Rabinovich), according to wikipedia:Verifiability policies. `'mikka (t) 16:07, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

It's a good idea, but once you have a single reference, that's already enough to write a decent stub. Shalom ^Hello 02:02, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] The original names (in their own languages)

There is a discussion on correctness of original names usage. I suggest to look at solid sources on chess. One of the best is http://www.olimpbase.org/ (see, http://www.olimpbase.org/statistics/all_id01.html). Mibelz 9:35, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

There is some ambiguity for some names, such as David Janowski or Dawid Janowski; and Aron Nimzovich or Aron Nimzowitsch. Both spelling variants can be found in chess literature. For list purposes, it is acceptable to choose any valid name, even if it is a redirect and not an article title. Shalom ^Hello 02:08, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Separate section for women?

Should we create a separate section for women chess players? I think we should because they compete in women-only tournaments, and have a women's world champion, so it is a relevant distinction - but I'd like some approval (even silent approval) so that if I do it, nobody will object. Shalom ^Hello 05:10, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

I rather think we shouldn’t, as it would imply the POV that women’s brains were not quite up to the standard of men’s brains. (Not something I have noticed.) —Ian Spackman 13:29, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Edgar Allan Poe

I would like to continue to point out my objection to listing Edgar Allan Poe as an "avid" player of chess. I am very well aware of his essay on Maelzel's Chess Player (in fact, I wrote a fair amount of the article on it) but I have yet to find evidence that Poe himself was a player, let alone an "avid" one. It's like suggesting that Oscar Wilde was an accomplished painter because he wrote The Picture of Dorian Gray. Even the description on this list says, "The people in this list are famous in other areas of activity, but are known to have played chess or maintain a current interest in chess." So, someone needs to provide a source that shows he played chess or maintained an interest in chess. Frankly, Poe's inclusion on this page lies somewhere between misleading and absolutely incorrect. I suggest his name be removed (again) until a source is found that shows real evidence beyond conjecture. Please consider reading WP:V in particular if you want to make a case for Poe. --Midnightdreary 01:18, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

I suggest changing the introductory wording to "famous people who show/showed an interest in chess" or some such phrase. It covers a multitude of levels of engagement. I will do this in a few days, unless I hear to the contrary. Brittle heaven 01:32, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

Rename it as you will but I still don't think Poe belongs on that list. The essay which serves as the only (circumstantial) evidence being used to merit his inclusion actually has very little to do with chess. Again, there is no evidence that Poe had any interest in chess whatsoever other than a familiarity that the game existed (surely, that by itself does not merit a listing here, does it?). Ultimately, Poe's listing here is a violation of original research and is not verifiable. Please, listen to reason here! I don't know how else to argue this... --Midnightdreary 01:41, 30 October 2007 (UTC)