Chess Quote - Mikhail Tal on Vices

I drink, I smoke, I gamble, I chase girls -- but postal chess is one vice I don't have.
-- Mikhail Tal

Mikhail "Misha" Tal (1936-1992) was a brilliant Soviet-Latvian chess grandmaster and the 8th World Chess Champion. Tal was a chain smoker and heavy drinker who lived life to the full, despite repeated bouts of ill-health.

I am uncertain which of "Dante's seven deadly vices" (see Wikipedia) Tal was referring to when describing postal chess as a vice. Perhaps he considered postal chess to equate with intellectual "sloth or laziness" as difficult chess board complications could be analysed at leisure - i.e. without the need for the immediate intense concentration and visualisation which is required for over-the-board play.

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