With the Berlin I was able to set up a fortress that he could come near but not breach.

My very first book was a games collection of Anatoly Karpov. On the whole I was attracted by positonal play with some tactics, and already then I was aiming for universality.

The Berlin Defence suited my strategy for the match. I had a defensive strategy - Actually, I had in my pocket some other sharper stuff to fall back on - but first I wanted to try the defensive strategy with Black and it worked so well.

Okay, when you start to fight for equality, like Anand did in 1995, you could end up losing game 10, like he did, without putting up any kind of fight.

I started playing chess when I was about 4 or 5 years old. It is very good for children to learn to play chess, because it helps them to develop their mental abilities. It also helps to consolidate a person's character, because as it happens both in life and in a chess game we have to make decisions constantly. In chess there is no luck and no excuses: everything is in your hands.

With the Berlin I was able to set up a fortress that he could come near but not breach.

For us chess players the language of artist is something natural.