Dear Sir,

Thank you for the opportunity to comment briefly on the recent denunciations of me in Larry Evans' column. To start with the latest assault, his August 2001 column quotes a reader as alleging that in 1986 I 'submitted an attack against Keene over 100 pages long'. In reality, my text consisted of two pages of factual self-defense (in reaction to a series of false attacks on me by Keene), supported by 22 pages of background corroboration (not all written by me). The assertion in the next paragraph that I am 'obsessed with attacking Raymond Keene and anything written by Keene' is equally silly. For instance, my Chess Notes column, published in New in Chess from mid-1998 until early 2001 (22 consecutive issues and 66 full pages) neither criticized nor even mentioned Keene a single time. The inaccuracy of Evans' column concerns the questions and answers, and in neither category has he shown willingness to take responsibility. After I complained in the February 2000 Chess Life that his column had made inaccurate and unattributed use of my Chess Notes material, he called my letter 'absurd', as well as professing ignorance that the material had come from my column, since his correspondent hadn't told him (and he naturally hadn't bothered to check). The splenetic peak, at least so far, is his July 2001 column, where he accused me of having been misleading, crude, sly and vile in a brief Kingpin item (not quoted correctly) from over a year ago. Yet what I wrote was 100% true. Indeed, the person who misled Kingpin readers was Evans himself. That was on a different matter (the details are omitted here for space reasons), but suffice it to say that Evans' conduct was described by his victim, Taylor Kingston, as 'amazingly, grossly dishonest'. Moreover, the Kingpin editor, Jonathan Manley, has commented: 'There can be no doubt that Larry Evans misled Kingpin readers. The evidence is incontrovertible, as shown by Taylor Kingston in Kingpin 32 (Spring 2000), p. 64. Evans' claim that Edward Winter is guilty of the same offence is simply ludicrous.' Following his string of pugnaciously inaccurate attacks on me, I wrote a comprehensive rebuttal, 'The Facts About Larry Evans', for the Skittles Room of the Chess CafĂ(c) (still available on-line in the archives section of www. chesscafe.com). It set out dozens of examples of Evans' errors and misrepresentations, including a selection of mistakes from his recent Chess Life columns. To show that my view of Evans' output is a common one, I also quoted the words of Yasser Seirawan: 'Experienced Evans-watchers know that it is the kind of untruth and distortion that is endemic in him.'

The illuminating discussion resulting from my Internet article bore out my warning that I had merely scratched the surface of the Evans problem. There was much revealing comment on his practice of (a) lifting passages from other people's chess books for presentation as his own words, (b) converting Internet newsgroup postings into questions for his column, and (c) resorting to even more virulent name-calling against me. What has not been offered, by Evans or anyone else, is a factual refutation of anything at all that I have written about him. Edward Winter Satigny, Switzerland EVANS ON WINTER Edward Winter talks about "the Evans problem." I will talk about the Winter problem.

Mr. Winter deliberately attributed to me an error in a reader's question --- knowing full well that many in his British audience don't realize I conduct a Q & A column. Former Chess Life editor Larry Parr called it a "cold, calculated, vicious lie designed to hurt and humiliate." 2. Mr. Winter denies an obsession with attacking GM Raymond Keene. Preposterous. His favorite targets are Keene, Kasparov, Soltis and other notables. True, he may not have attacked Keene in New In Chess but he "forgot" -- if that is quite the word -- that he expended thousands of words elsewhere. In his Chess Explorations alone, there are 19 references, nearly all unfavorable, and one with animal language in describing Keene and Divinsky's Warriors of the Mind as "swill." He claims the book "juggles" figures when concluding that Kasparov is the strongest player of all time, yet he offers NOT ONE WORD refuting the statistical method.

3. Mr. Winter called me "shameless" and my column "unspeakable" in his lengthy screed on the Net. He cited some 25 errors ("dozens") searching back half a century through the 10 million or so words that I penned on chess. He found such horrific typos as "Austalia" (Australia), "Mitchell" (Michell), " aviod" ("avoid" -- a publisher's error on the spine of one of my books) and chided me for spelling Averbakh as Averbach. He also dredged up three games that I had already corrected! When writing his attack Mr. Winter also " forgot" -- if that is quite the word -- that I had awarded the Best Question in November 1999 to a reader who pointed out one of the errors he cited.

4. Mr. Winter childishly quotes Yasser Seirawan and one Jonathan Manley, his editor at KINGPIN. In this imperfect world, anyone can quote someone against anyone. He "forgot" -- if that is quite the word -- that GM Seirawan and I entertain mutually low opinions of each other. Here -- to play Mr. Winter's silly game -- is what IM John Watson, who has attacked me, wrote about his "one-sided and pre-ordained" conclusions: "Winter seems to stick with his heroes and his villains, come what may, and is very selective in what he reports about them."

5. In February 2000 Mr. Winter alleged that I "lifted" material from his work after a Filipino reader inquired about two games in Chess Asia ( see A Fine Myth, December '99, page 14). I responded that the question was used word for word and didn't mention him. Irked, he now accuses me of not " bothering to check" an Asian magazine which is nearly impossible to get in America. Yet he "forgot" -- if that is quite the word -- that given his logic I'd have to check every magazine in the world before using ANY question about something in them.

6. I plead "guilty" to seeking permission from writers on the Net for using items that are likely to interest my readers. Over the years, every reader survey has ranked my column at or near the top. Mr. Winter "forgot" -- if that is quite the word -- to mention that his New In Chess column was cancelled for lack of reader interest. There is no anger like that of a chess pedant scorned.

7. Mr. Winter claims that nobody has refuted his facts. He "forgot" -- if that is quite the word -- about a thread entitled Winter's Humbug in rec.games.chess.politics, a newsgroup that can be accessed on the Net. Humbug is indeed the operative word.

Larry Evans

Reno, Nevada

----------------- Forwarded Message: Subj: Evans/Winter Exchange Date: 8/29/2001 7:56:42 AM Pacific Daylight Time From: Chesstours To: RDKOBE@aol.com

Ray Thought you'd like to see Edward Winter's letter to the editor of Chess Life in October 2001 and my response. What is your objective evaluation of this exchange? Dear Sir, Thank you for the opportunity to comment briefly on the recent denunciations of me in Larry Evans' column. To start with the latest assault, his August 2001 column quotes a reader as alleging that in 1986 I 'submitted an attack against Keene over 100 pages long'. In reality, my text consisted of two pages of factual self-defense (in reaction to a series of false attacks on me by Keene), supported by 22 pages of background corroboration (not all written by me). The assertion in the next paragraph that I am 'obsessed with attacking Raymond Keene and anything written by Keene' is equally silly. For instance, my Chess Notes column, published in New in Chess from mid-1998 until early 2001 (22 consecutive issues and 66 full pages) neither criticized nor even mentioned Keene a single time. The inaccuracy of Evans' column concerns the questions and answers, and in neither category has he shown willingness to take responsibility. After I complained in the February 2000 Chess Life that his column had made inaccurate and unattributed use of my Chess Notes material, he called my letter 'absurd', as well as professing ignorance that the material had come from my column, since his correspondent hadn't told him (and he naturally hadn't bothered to check). The splenetic peak, at least so far, is his July 2001 column, where he accused me of having been misleading, crude, sly and vile in a brief Kingpin item (not quoted correctly) from over a year ago. Yet what I wrote was 100% true. Indeed, the person who misled Kingpin readers was Evans himself. That was on a different matter (the details are omitted here for space reasons), but suffice it to say that Evans' conduct was described by his victim, Taylor Kingston, as 'amazingly, grossly dishonest'. Moreover, the Kingpin editor, Jonathan Manley, has commented: 'There can be no doubt that Larry Evans misled Kingpin readers. The evidence is incontrovertible, as shown by Taylor Kingston in Kingpin 32 (Spring 2000), p. 64. Evans' claim that Edward Winter is guilty of the same offence is simply ludicrous.' Following his string of pugnaciously inaccurate attacks on me, I wrote a comprehensive rebuttal, 'The Facts About Larry Evans', for the Skittles Room of the Chess CafĂ(c) (still available on-line in the archives section of www. chesscafe.com). It set out dozens of examples of Evans' errors and misrepresentations, including a selection of mistakes from his recent Chess Life columns. To show that my view of Evans' output is a common one, I also quoted the words of Yasser Seirawan: 'Experienced Evans-watchers know that it is the kind of untruth and distortion that is endemic in him.' The illuminating discussion resulting from my Internet article bore out my warning that I had merely scratched the surface of the Evans problem. There was much revealing comment on his practice of (a) lifting passages from other people's chess books for presentation as his own words, (b) converting Internet newsgroup postings into questions for his column, and (c) resorting to even more virulent name-calling against me. What has not been offered, by Evans or anyone else, is a factual refutation of anything at all that I have written about him. Yours faithfully, Edward Winter Larry Evans Responds Edward Winter talks about "the Evans problem." I will talk about the Winter problem. 1. Mr. Winter wrote this outright lie in KINGPIN: "A small example of the Evans approach to historical truth arises from his December 1999 column, which included the following: `Wilhelm Steinitz was 50 when he defeated Johannes Zukertort (44) in 1892.'" My response in the July 2001 Chess Life: "Did 1892 appear in my December 1999 column as Edward Winter charges? Yes! However he `forgot' -- if that is quite the word--to mention it was part of the reader's question, not my answer. Nice." Mr. Winter deliberately attributed to me an error in a reader's question --- knowing full well that many in his British audience don't realize I conduct a Q & A column. Former Chess Life editor Larry Parr called it a "cold, calculated, vicious lie designed to hurt and humiliate." 2. Mr. Winter denies an obsession with attacking GM Raymond Keene. Preposterous. His favorite targets are Keene, Kasparov, Soltis and other notables. True, he may not have attacked Keene in New In Chess but he " forgot" -- if that is quite the word -- that he expended thousands of words elsewhere. In his Chess Explorations alone, there are 19 references, nearly all unfavorable, and one with animal language in describing Keene and Divinsky's Warriors of the Mind as "swill." He claims the book "juggles" figures when concluding that Kasparov is the strongest player of all time, yet he offers NOT ONE WORD refuting the statistical method. 3. Mr. Winter called me "shameless" and my column "unspeakable" in his lengthy screed on the Net. He cited some 25 errors ("dozens") searching back half a century through the 10 million or so words that I penned on chess. He found such horrific typos as "Austalia" (Australia), "Mitchell" (Michell), " aviod" ("avoid" -- a publisher's error on the spine of one of my books) and chided me for spelling Averbakh as Averbach. He also dredged up three games that I had already corrected! When writing his attack Mr. Winter also "forgot" -- if that is quite the word -- that I had awarded the Best Question in November 1999 to a reader who pointed out one of the errors he cited. 4. Mr. Winter childishly quotes Yasser Seirawan and one Jonathan Manley, his editor at KINGPIN. In this imperfect world, anyone can quote someone against anyone. He "forgot" -- if that is quite the word -- that GM Seirawan and I entertain mutually low opinions of each other. Here -- to play Mr. Winter's silly game -- is what IM John Watson, who has attacked me, wrote about his "one-sided and pre-ordained" conclusions: "Winter seems to stick with his heroes and his villains, come what may, and is very selective in what he reports about them." 5. In February 2000 Mr. Winter alleged that I "lifted" material from his work after a Filipino reader inquired about two games in Chess Asia (see A Fine Myth, December '99, page 14). I responded that the question was used word for word and didn't mention him. Irked, he now accuses me of not " bothering to check" an Asian magazine which is nearly impossible to get in America. Yet he "forgot" -- if that is quite the word -- that given his logic I'd have to check every magazine in the world before using ANY question about something in them. 6. I plead "guilty" to seeking permission from writers on the Net for using items that are likely to interest my readers. Over the years, every reader survey has ranked my column at or near the top. Mr. Winter "forgot" -- if that is quite the word -- to mention that his New In Chess column was cancelled for lack of reader interest. There is no anger like that of a chess pedant scorned. 7. Mr. Winter claims that nobody has refuted his facts. He "forgot" -- if that is quite the word -- about a thread entitled Winter's Humbug in rec. games.chess.politics, a newsgroup that can be accessed on the Net. Humbug is indeed the operative word.

Return-path: From: Chesstours@cs.com Full-name: Chesstours Message-ID: Date: Fri, 7 Sep 2001 00:53:59 EDT Subject: Fwd: Evans/Winter Exchange To: overlord@chessworks.com MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="part2_159.be9210.28c9ace7_boundary" X-Mailer: CompuServe 2000 32-bit sub 122

I Eric

I'd also like to post Edward Winterâ€(tm)s letter to the editor of Chess Life in October 2001 and my response.

WINTER ON EVANS Dear Sir, Thank you for the opportunity to comment briefly on the recent denunciations of me in Larry Evans' column. To start with the latest assault, his August 2001 column quotes a reader as alleging that in 1986 I 'submitted an attack against Keene over 100 pages long'. In reality, my text consisted of two pages of factual self-defense (in reaction to a series of false attacks on me by Keene), supported by 22 pages of background corroboration (not all written by me). The assertion in the next paragraph that I am 'obsessed with attacking Raymond Keene and anything written by Keene' is equally silly. For instance, my Chess Notes column, published in New in Chess from mid-1998 until early 2001 (22 consecutive issues and 66 full pages) neither criticized nor even mentioned Keene a single time. The inaccuracy of Evans' column concerns the questions and answers, and in neither category has he shown willingness to take responsibility. After I complained in the February 2000 Chess Life that his column had made inaccurate and unattributed use of my Chess Notes material, he called my letter 'absurd', as well as professing ignorance that the material had come from my column, since his correspondent hadn't told him (and he naturally hadn't bothered to check). The splenetic peak, at least so far, is his July 2001 column, where he accused me of having been misleading, crude, sly and vile in a brief Kingpin item (not quoted correctly) from over a year ago. Yet what I wrote was 100% true. Indeed, the person who misled Kingpin readers was Evans himself. That was on a different matter (the details are omitted here for space reasons), but suffice it to say that Evans' conduct was described by his victim, Taylor Kingston, as 'amazingly, grossly dishonest'. Moreover, the Kingpin editor, Jonathan Manley, has commented: 'There can be no doubt that Larry Evans misled Kingpin readers. The evidence is incontrovertible, as shown by Taylor Kingston in Kingpin 32 (Spring 2000), p. 64. Evans' claim that Edward Winter is guilty of the same offence is simply ludicrous.' Following his string of pugnaciously inaccurate attacks on me, I wrote a comprehensive rebuttal, 'The Facts About Larry Evans', for the Skittles Room of the Chess CafĂ(c) (still available on-line in the archives section of www. chesscafe.com). It set out dozens of examples of Evans' errors and misrepresentations, including a selection of mistakes from his recent Chess Life columns. To show that my view of Evans' output is a common one, I also quoted the words of Yasser Seirawan: 'Experienced Evans-watchers know that it is the kind of untruth and distortion that is endemic in him.' The illuminating discussion resulting from my Internet article bore out my warning that I had merely scratched the surface of the Evans problem. There was much revealing comment on his practice of (a) lifting passages from other people's chess books for presentation as his own words, (b) converting Internet newsgroup postings into questions for his column, and (c) resorting to even more virulent name-calling against me. What has not been offered, by Evans or anyone else, is a factual refutation of anything at all that I have written about him. Edward Winter

Satigny, Switzerland

EVANS ON WINTER Edward Winter talks about "the Evans problem." I will talk about the Winter problem. 1. Mr. Winter wrote this outright lie in KINGPIN: "A small example of the Evans approach to historical truth arises from his December 1999 column, which included the following: `Wilhelm Steinitz was 50 when he defeated Johannes Zukertort (44) in 1892.'" My response in the July 2001 Chess Life: "Did 1892 appear in my December 1999 column as Edward Winter charges? Yes! However he `forgot' -- if that is quite the word--to mention it was part of the reader's question, not my answer. Nice." Mr. Winter deliberately attributed to me an error in a reader's question --- knowing full well that many in his British audience don't realize I conduct a Q & A column. Former Chess Life editor Larry Parr called it a "cold, calculated, vicious lie designed to hurt and humiliate." 2. Mr. Winter denies an obsession with attacking GM Raymond Keene. Preposterous. His favorite targets are Keene, Kasparov, Soltis and other notables. True, he may not have attacked Keene in New In Chess but he " forgot" -- if that is quite the word -- that he expended thousands of words elsewhere. In his Chess Explorations alone, there are 19 references, nearly all unfavorable, and one with animal language in describing Keene and Divinsky's Warriors of the Mind as "swill." He claims the book "juggles" figures when concluding that Kasparov is the strongest player of all time, yet he offers NOT ONE WORD refuting the statistical method. 3. Mr. Winter called me "shameless" and my column "unspeakable" in his lengthy screed on the Net. He cited some 25 errors ("dozens") searching back half a century through the 10 million or so words that I penned on chess. He found such horrific typos as "Austalia" (Australia), "Mitchell" (Michell), " aviod" ("avoid" -- a publisher's error on the spine of one of my books) and chided me for spelling Averbakh as Averbach. He also dredged up three games that I had already corrected! When writing his attack Mr. Winter also "forgot" -- if that is quite the word -- that I had awarded the Best Question in November 1999 to a reader who pointed out one of the errors he cited. 4. Mr. Winter childishly quotes Yasser Seirawan and one Jonathan Manley, his editor at KINGPIN. In this imperfect world, anyone can quote someone against anyone. He "forgot" -- if that is quite the word -- that GM Seirawan and I entertain mutually low opinions of each other. Here -- to play Mr. Winter's silly game -- is what IM John Watson, who has attacked me, wrote about his "one-sided and pre-ordained" conclusions: "Winter seems to stick with his heroes and his villains, come what may, and is very selective in what he reports about them." 5. In February 2000 Mr. Winter alleged that I "lifted" material from his work after a Filipino reader inquired about two games in Chess Asia (see A Fine Myth, December '99, page 14). I responded that the question was used word for word and didn't mention him. Irked, he now accuses me of not " bothering to check" an Asian magazine which is nearly impossible to get in America. Yet he "forgot" -- if that is quite the word -- that given his logic I'd have to check every magazine in the world before using ANY question about something in them. 6. I plead "guilty" to seeking permission from writers on the Net for using items that are likely to interest my readers. Over the years, every reader survey has ranked my column at or near the top. Mr. Winter "forgot" -- if that is quite the word -- to mention that his New In Chess column was cancelled for lack of reader interest. There is no anger like that of a chess pedant scorned. 7. Mr. Winter claims that nobody has refuted his facts. He "forgot" -- if that is quite the word -- about a thread entitled Winter's Humbug in rec. games.chess.politics, a newsgroup that can be accessed on the Net. Humbug is indeed the operative word.

Larry Evans Reno, Nevada