Theory of Shadows

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Call Number: Fiction / Maurensig, Paolo
On Shelf At: Downtown Library

Location & Checkout Length	Call Number	Checkout Length	Item Status
Downtown 2nd Floor 4-week checkout	Fiction / Maurensig, Paolo	4-week checkout	On Shelf

"Originally published in Italian in 2015 by Adelphi Edizioni, Italy, as Teoria delle ombre"--Title page verso.
Novel inspired by the death of Alexander Alekhine (1892-1946), Russian chess player, naturalized French citizen.
On the morning of March 24, 1946, the world chess champion Alexander Alekhine--"sadist of the chess world," renowned for his eccentric behavior as well as the ruthlessness of his playing style--was found dead in his hotel room in Estoril, Portugal. He was fully dressed and wearing an overcoat, slumped back in a chair, in front of a meal, a chessboard just out of reach. The doctor overseeing the autopsy certified that Alekhine died of asphyxiation due to a piece of meat stuck in his larynx and assured the world that there was absolutely no evidence of suicide or foul play. Some, of course, have commented that the photos of the corpse look suspiciously theatrical, as though staged. Others have wondered why Alekhine would have sat down to his dinner in a hot room while wearing a heavy overcoat. And what about all these rumors concerning Alekhine's activities during World War II? Did he really pen a series of articles on the inherent inferiority of Jewish chess players? Can he really be seen in photographs with high-ranking Nazi officials? And as for his own homeland, is it true that the Russians considered him a traitor, as well as a possible threat to the new generation of supposedly superior Soviet chess masters?

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