Jan. 18 (Bloomberg) -- Bobby Fischer, the American chess prodigy who defeated the Soviet Union's best player at the height of the Cold War to become the only U.S. world champion, then spent the next three decades in self-imposed exile and anti- American rage, has died. He was 64.
Fischer died of kidney failure yesterday in a Reykjavik, Iceland, hospital after a long illness, the Associated Press reported, citing his spokesman, Gardar Sverrisson.
It was in Reykjavik in 1972 that Fischer defeated Boris Spassky in a two-month match that transfixed a worldwide audience, both for its significance as a Cold War proxy and the idiosyncratic behavior of its 29-year-old underdog. At one point, Fischer insisted the match be relocated to a room not much bigger than a closet because he was bothered by the sound of television cameras.
Fischer's defeat of Spassky was a revolutionary moment in the international sporting world, on par with the U.S. Olympic hockey team's defeat of its seemingly unbeatable Soviet counterpart in Lake Placid, New York, in 1980, or Australia's 1983 victory over the U.S. in yachting's America's Cup, ending the world's longest winning streak -- 132 years.
Fischer characterized ``this little thing between me and Spassky'' as no less than ``the free world against the lying, cheating, hypocritical Russians'' and ``a microcosm of the whole world political situation.''
Match Point
What became known as the ``match of the century'' almost didn't happen because of Fischer's demands about the prize money and playing conditions. The possibility of Fischer refusing to play was so troubling to U.S. officials that President Richard Nixon directed Secretary of State Henry Kissinger to place a call to Fischer.
Fischer arrived in Iceland just hours before the match was to begin on July 11, 1972, and made uncharacteristic mistakes that led to a Spassky victory in the first game.
Fischer resumed his complaints: now he was bothered by the cameras in the competition hall. Match organizers called his bluff when he refused to play, and Spassky was awarded the second game by forfeit.
At Fischer's insistence, the third game was moved to a small room and broadcast to the live audience via closed-circuit television. Fischer won that game and never looked back, even after the match returned to the main stage.
Piling up Wins
As Fischer piled up wins, he complained about the shininess of the chess board and the proximity of the audience, while Spassky's Soviet advisers accused Fischer of wearing a concealed electronic device.
On Sept. 3, after the 21st game of the match had adjourned, Spassky resigned the game by telephone. That gave Fischer 12 1/2 points to Spassky's 8 1/2, clinching the victory. In all, even with his forfeit, Fischer had won seven games and lost three, with 11 ending in draws.
Fischer returned home an American hero, but was already souring on the nation that saluted him.
``He later said to a reporter, `The creeps are beginning to gather,''' Shelby Lyman, who hosted public television's coverage of the Fischer-Spassky match, told Atlantic Monthly magazine in 2002. ``He was referring to press, lawyers, agents -- everyone he thought was out to take advantage of him. After that his whole life was about avoiding the creeps.''
Best U.S. Player
He was regarded in the chess world as the greatest U.S. player, and may have been the best natural talent to play the game. He worked as an individual, studying alone and practicing against himself, a contrast to well-prepared Soviet players backed by teams of strategists.
``The gap between Mr. Fischer and his contemporaries was the largest ever,'' fellow grandmaster Garry Kasparov wrote in the Wall Street Journal in 2004.
Fischer was known for unpredictable tactics at the board and bold, flamboyant attacks. He took risks, enjoyed complicated positions, and kept opponents guessing by rarely repeating opening strategies during matches. Chess books cite Fischer as achieving an IQ score of more than 180 in tests at Erasmus Hall High School in Brooklyn, New York, before he dropped out at age 16.
He often unnerved competitors with what some of them considered psychological warfare. For example, Fischer's failure to appear for the second game of the 1972 Spassky match is sometimes cited as a turning point in that contest, and chess writers have speculated that Spassky's composure was undermined.
The popularity of chess in the U.S. is widely attributed to Fischer's compelling victory. Yet his legacy is tarnished by his actions away from the game he mastered.
Spassky Rematch
After 20 reclusive years, he violated a U.S. ban by playing a 1992 rematch with Spassky on an island in the Adriatic Sea that was part of Yugoslavia, then under United Nations sanctions. As the years passed he became more vitriolic in his denunciations of the U.S. After the attacks of Sept. 11, he gave a radio interview praising the terrorists and urging the arrest of all U.S. Jews.
The 1993 movie ``Searching for Bobby Fischer'' told the story of a young chess prodigy who tries to adopt Fischer's legendary ruthlessness at the chess board without also mimicking his angry approach to the larger world.
Robert James Fischer was born March 9, 1943, in Chicago. After his parents divorced, Fischer's mother Regina, who was of German Jewish descent, moved Bobby and his sister, Joan, to California, then to Arizona, and finally to New York.
At their Brooklyn apartment, Bobby learned from his sister how to play chess at age 6 and was playing competitively within two years. Fixated on his chess-playing, Fischer dropped out of high school and became the youngest U.S. national champion at 14, and an international grandmaster a year later.
Lost Title
His 1972 triumph over Spassky was followed by two decades of withdrawal from competitive play as he lived as a recluse. The first challenger to his title was the Soviet Union's Anatoly Karpov, in 1975. Fischer eventually boycotted the match, and he lost his title without making a single move.
In 1992, Fischer emerged for the rematch with Spassky, which he won, taking about $3.5 million in prize money. The U.S. government issued a warrant for his arrest for taking part in the competition, claiming he violated UN sanctions against the country in place during the Balkan wars. By then, a split in chess authorities meant Kasparov was widely recognized as world champion, although Fischer objected.
Spassky was ``very sorry'' to hear of his former opponent's death, he told the New York Times from France.
Japan Arrest
In contrast to pictures of the young champion in suits, in later life Fischer often sported a long, unkempt beard and baseball cap. In 1981, he was arrested after being mistaken for a bank robber in California. He later said he was brutalized by police.
Fischer was arrested in 2004 at a Japanese airport, and was accused of trying to leave the country on a revoked passport. He was detained for eight months. After considering his deportation to the U.S., the authorities released him to Iceland in 2005 after the country offered him citizenship.
He often criticized the U.S., renounced his American citizenship, and though his mother was Jewish, he frequently made anti-Semitic remarks in media interviews.
To contact the reporter on this story: Laurence Arnold in Washington at larnold4@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editor responsible for this story: James Greiff at jgreiff@bloomberg.net.
Dubbed as one of the world's greatest chess players of all-time, Bobby Fischer has died at the age of 64 from , according to his spokesman Gardar Sverrisson. He died in Iceland at a hospital in .

Fischer is most known for beating his opponent  from the then  in 1972, to become the first and so far only American world champion chess player. He became a  in August of 1958 at the young age of 15.

Fischer was also a fugitive of the U.S. after violating the terms of  sanctions by going to an island of the former country of  in 1992 to play Spassky in a rematch, and won. He was detained in Japan for nine months through 2004 and 2005, accused of trying to leave the country on a revoked U.S. passport. After his detainment he was granted Icelandic citizenship and moved to the country in 2005, instead of being deported to the U.S. by the Japanese government.

"Fischer was the pioneer, some would say the founder, of professional chess. His death is very sad news," said Garry Kasparov, a former world champion of chess.

Fisher was born on March 9, 1943 in Chicago, Illinois.