I want to serve chess through games, books that are works of art. I would like to bring the game closer to many people all over the world.

There can be no finer example of the inspiring powers of competition to shatter the status quo than Hungary's Judit Polgar.

I wouldn't overestimate the importance of my popularity in the country and abroad but at the end of the day it's not as important because I believe that my presence here could make some difference and it could encourage people.

In general there is something puzzling about the fact that the most renowned figures in chess - Morphy, Pillsbury, Capablanca and Fischer - were born in America.

Many Republicans who traditionally were for a positive role in the world, anti-Russian, now they want to defend their party and leader, and they don't care about real arguments. The paradox is the Democrats were so timid in criticising Vladimir Putin. Barack Obama appeased him and now they are criticising Putin's interference in American democracy. It is a strange reversal of the roles.

I think Russian people are learning that democracy is not an alien thing; it's not a western invention.

Machines taking over jobs - it's the history of civilization. Replacing farm animals, old forms of manual labor, now taking over small, menial aspects of cognition. But there's still plenty of room for creativity, for curiosity - many things that are related to passion, like art. But also, things about human communication and challenges, massive challenges that we left behind because we didn't want to take so much risk, such as space exploration, deep ocean exploration.