The 2021 International Chess Calendar

Periodically, chess publishers still send me materials to review, even after I stopped blogging for months. My conscience generally forces me to mention the material, even if it was totally unsolicited, so that's what I'll do with this offering from Russell Enterprises.

First of all, the days are correct. (Never underestimate the power of Murphy's Law.) It thus succeeds as a calendar.

Here's what you get from this wall calendar. The top page has a picture of someone or some event who anniversary came either 100, 75, 50, or 25 years earlier, and there's a descriptive paragraph below the picture. On the right column, there's a game by the featured player or from the featured event. On the left column of the top page some highlights are listed from (again) 100, 75, 50, and 25 years ago that month.

On the lower page, each date lists the birthday or day of passing of some notable chess player - I'd guess there are about 7 entries per day, on average. (In the unlikely event you were wondering, I apparently didn't qualify as sufficiently "notable". Russell Enterprises has its standards! Sadly, it turns out that Andrey Zhigalko somehow managed to die on his birthday in 1985. How he managed to become a GM after that and to be alive to this day is probably a mystery of time travel. Or perhaps a typo - I'll leave that to the scienticians.) There's also a puzzle, which maintains the theme of having played that month and from one of the four earlier years described above.

If you're the kind of person who reads the World Almanac for fun each year, you should get this. (I'm not making fun; I was that guy.) Likewise if you're a self-motivated chess history buff who might use this to look up the day's players. Finally, I recommend this as an historical artifact for those of you who are asking, "Grandpa, what's a wall calendar?"