Paul Keres

Keres, c. 1938

Keres was born in the town of Narva (now in Estonia), then Petrograd Governorate of the Russian Empire. He was two years old when Estonia became an independent country in 1918. Keres first learned about chess from his father and his elder brother Harald (afterwards a prominent physicist, who later told friendly jokes to his students: "I am not Paul's brother; Paul is my brother"). With the scarcity of chess literature in his home town, he learned about chess notation from the chess puzzles in the daily newspaper, and compiled a handwritten collection of almost 1000 games.[2] In his early days, he was known for a brilliant and sharp attacking style.[3]

Keres was a three-time schoolboy champion of the country, in 1930, 1932, and 1933. His playing matured after playing correspondence chess extensively while in high school. He probably played about 500 correspondence games, and at one stage had 150 correspondence games going simultaneously. In 1935, he won the Internationaler Fernschachbund (IFSB) international correspondence chess championship. From 1937 to 1941 he studied mathematics at the University of Tartu, and competed in several interuniversity matches.[4]

Keres achieved a very good result at the age of 17 in a Master tournament at Tallinn 1933 with 5/7 (+5−2=0), tied 3rd–4th, half a point behind joint winners Paul Felix Schmidt and V. Kappe.[5] Keres became champion of Estonia for the first time in 1935. He tied for first (+5−2=1) with Gunnar Friedemann in the tournament, then defeated him (+2−1=0) in the playoff match. In April 1935, Keres defeated Feliks Kibbermann, one of Tartu's leading masters, in a training match, by (+3−1=0).[6]

Keres played on top board for Estonia in the 6th Chess Olympiad at Warsaw 1935, and was regarded as the new star, admired for his dashing style. His success there gave him the confidence to venture onto the international circuit.

At Helsinki 1935, he placed 2nd behind Paulin Frydman with 6½/8 (+6−1=1). He won at Tallinn 1936 with 9/10 (+8−0=2). Keres' first major international success against top-level competition came at Bad Nauheim 1936, where he tied for first with Alexander Alekhine at 6½/9 (+4−0=5). He struggled at Dresden 1936, placing only 8–9th with (+2−4=3), but wrote that he learned an important lesson from this setback. Keres recovered at Zandvoort 1936 with a shared 3rd–4th place (+5−3=3). He then defended his Estonian title in 1936 by drawing a challenge match against Paul Felix Schmidt with (+3−3=1).[7]

Keres had a series of successes in 1937. He won in Tallinn with 7½/9 (+6−0=3), then shared 1st–2nd at Margate with Reuben Fine at 7½/9 (+6−0=3), 1½ points ahead of Alekhine. In Ostend, he tied 1st–3rd places with Fine and Henry Grob at 6/9 (+5−2=2). Keres dominated in Prague to claim first with 10/11 (+9−0=2). He then won a theme tournament in Vienna with 4½/6 (+4−1=1); the tournament saw all games commence with the moves 1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 Ne4, known as the Döry Defence. He tied for 4–5th places at Kemeri with 11½/17 (+8−2=7), as Salo Flohr, Vladimirs Petrovs and Samuel Reshevsky won. Then he tied 2nd–4th in Pärnu with 4½/7 (+3−1=3).

This successful string earned him an invitation to the tournament at Semmering–Baden 1937, which he won with 9/14 (+6−2=6), ahead of Fine, José Raúl Capablanca, Reshevsky, and Erich Eliskases. Keres, in his autobiographical games collection, refers to this major event as a 'Candidates' Tournament', and claimed that he was recognized as a Grandmaster after winning it,[8] although its parallel connection with later FIDE-organized Candidates' tournaments (from 1950 onwards) is not exact, and the Grandmaster title was not formalized by FIDE until 1950.

Keres tied for second at Hastings 1937–38 with 6½/9 (+4−0=5) (half a point behind Reshevsky), and at Noordwijk 1938 (behind Eliskases) with 6½/9 (+4−0=5). Keres drew an exhibition match at Stockholm 1938 with Gideon Ståhlberg on 4–4 (+2−2=4).[7]

He continued to represent Estonia with success in Olympiad play. His detailed results for Estonia follow. Of note was the team bronze medal attained by Estonia in 1939; this was exceptional for a country with a population of less than two million people.[9]

• Warsaw 1935, Estonia board 1, 12½/19 (+11−5=3);
• Munich 1936 (unofficial Olympiad), Estonia board 1, 15½/20 (+12−1=7), board gold medal;
• Stockholm 1937, Estonia board 1, 11/15 (+9−2=4), board silver medal;
• Buenos Aires 1939, Estonia board 1, 14½/19 (+12−2=5), team bronze medal.

Keres playing against Reuben Fine at AVRO tournament in 1938

In 1938, he tied with Fine for first, with 8½/14, in the all-star AVRO tournament, held in various cities in the Netherlands, ahead of chess legends Mikhail Botvinnik, Max Euwe, Reshevsky, Alekhine, Capablanca and Flohr. AVRO was one of the strongest tournaments in history; some chess historians believe it the strongest ever staged. Keres won on tiebreak because he beat Fine 1½–½ in their individual two games.

It was expected that the winner of this tournament would be the challenger for the World Chess Championship, in a match against World Champion Alexander Alekhine, but the outbreak of the Second World War, especially because of the first occupation of Estonia by the Soviet Union in 1940–41, brought negotiations with Alekhine to an end. Keres had begun his university studies in 1937, and this also played a role in the failure to set up a match.

Keres struggled at Leningrad–Moscow 1939 with a shared 12–13th place; he wrote that he had not had enough time to prepare for this very strong event, where he faced many Soviet top players for the first time. But he recovered with more preparation time, and won Margate 1939 with 7½/9 (+6−0=3), ahead of Capablanca and Flohr.[7]

During World War II, the previously independent nation of Estonia was invaded and occupied by the Stalinist Soviet Union in June 1940, until the 1941 invasion and occupation by Nazi Germany, until the Soviet Union occupied Estonia again in 1944, and the country remained under Soviet control for the rest of Keres' life. The 1944 Soviet reconquest of Estonia was a particularly dangerous time for Keres.

At the outbreak of WWII in 1939, Keres was in Buenos Aires, Argentina for the Olympiad. He stayed on to play in a Buenos Aires international tournament after the Olympiad, and tied for first place with Miguel Najdorf with 8½/11 (+7−1=3).

His next event was a 14-game match with former World Champion Max Euwe in the Netherlands, held from December 1939 – January 1940. Keres won a hard-fought struggle by 7½–6½ (+6−5=3). This was a superb achievement, because not only was Euwe a former World Champion, but he had enormous experience at match play, far more than Keres.

Keres in 1954

Although Keres participated in the 1948 World Championship tournament, arranged to determine the world champion after Alekhine's death in 1946, his performance was far from his best. Held jointly in The Hague and Moscow, the tournament was limited to five participants: Mikhail Botvinnik, Vasily Smyslov, Paul Keres, Samuel Reshevsky, and Max Euwe. (Reuben Fine had also been invited but declined.) The event was played as a quintuple round-robin. Keres finished joint third, with 10½ out of 20 points. In his individual match with the winner, Botvinnik, he lost four of five games, winning only in the last round when the tournament's result was already determined.

Since Keres lost his first four games against Botvinnik in the 1948 tournament, suspicions have sometimes been raised that Keres was forced to "throw" games to allow Botvinnik to win the championship. Chess historian Taylor Kingston investigated all the available evidence and arguments, and concluded that: Soviet chess officials gave Keres strong hints that he should not hinder Botvinnik's attempt to win the World Championship; Botvinnik only discovered this about halfway through the tournament and protested so strongly that he angered Soviet officials; Keres probably did not deliberately lose games to Botvinnik or anyone else in the tournament.[12]

Keres finished second or equal second in four straight Candidates' tournaments (1953, 1956, 1959, 1962), making him the player with the most runner-up finishes in that event. (He was therefore occasionally nicknamed "Paul II".) Keres participated in a total of six Candidates' Tournaments:[7]

• Budapest 1950, 4th, behind David Bronstein and Isaac Boleslavsky, with 9½/18 (+3−2=13).
• Zürich 1953, tied 2nd–4th, along with David Bronstein and Reshevsky, two points behind Smyslov, with 16/28 (+8−4=16).
• Amsterdam 1956, 2nd, 1½ points behind Smyslov, with 10/18 (+3−1=14).
• Yugoslavia 1959, 2nd, 1½ points behind Mikhail Tal, with 18½/28 (+15−6=7). He had positive or equal scores against all the competitors, including 3–1 against Tal, but this was not enough, since Tal scored 14½/16 against the bottom four finishers.
• Curaçao 1962, tied 2nd–3rd, with Efim Geller, half a point behind Tigran Petrosian, with 17/27 (+9−2=16). This event is discussed further at World Chess Championship 1963. Keres won a match at Moscow 1962 against Geller, for an exempt place in the 1965 Candidates, by 4½–3½ (+2−1=5).
• Riga 1965, lost his quarter-final match to eventual Candidates' winner Boris Spassky by 6–4 (+2−4=4). This was the only match loss of Keres' long career.

Keres' run of four successive second places in Candidates' tournaments (1953, 1956, 1959, 1962) has prompted suspicions that he was under orders not to win these events. Taylor Kingston concludes that: there was probably no pressure from Soviet officials, since from 1954 onwards, Keres was rehabilitated and Botvinnik was no longer in favour with officials. At Curaçao 1962, there was an unofficial conspiracy by Petrosian, Geller and Keres, and this worked out to Keres' disadvantage, since he may have been slightly stronger than both Petrosian and Geller at this stage.[13] Bronstein, in his final book, published just after his death in late 2006, wrote that the Soviet chess leadership favoured Smyslov to win Zurich 1953, and pressured several of the other top Soviets to arrange this outcome, which did in fact occur. Bronstein wrote that Keres was ordered to draw his second cycle game with Smyslov, to conserve Smyslov's fading physical strength; Keres, who still had his own hopes of winning the event, tried as White to win an attacking game, but instead lost because of Smyslov's excellent play.[14]

In several other post-war events, however, Keres dominated the field. He won the exceptionally strong USSR Chess Championship three times. In 1947, he won at Leningrad, URS-ch15, with 14/19 (+10−1=8); the field included every top Soviet player except Botvinnik. In 1950, he won at Moscow, URS-ch18, with 11½/17 (+8−2=7) against a field which was only slightly weaker than in 1947. Then in 1951, he triumphed again at Moscow, URS-ch19, with 12/17 (+9−2=6),[7] against a super-class field which included Efim Geller, Petrosian, Smyslov, Botvinnik, Yuri Averbakh, David Bronstein, Mark Taimanov, Lev Aronin, Salo Flohr, Igor Bondarevsky, and Alexander Kotov.

Keres won Pärnu 1947 with 9½/13 (+7−1=5), Szczawno-Zdrój 1950 with 14½/19 (+11−1=7), and Budapest 1952 with 12½/17 (+10−2=5),[7] the latter ahead of world champion Botvinnik and an all-star field which included Geller, Smyslov, Gideon Ståhlberg, László Szabo, and Petrosian. The Budapest victory, which capped a stretch of four first-class wins over a two-year span, may represent the peak of his career. The Hungarian master and writer Egon Varnusz, in his books on Keres, states that at this time, "The best player in the world was Paul Keres".[15]

After being forced to become a Soviet citizen, despite being Estonian, Keres had to represent the Soviet Union in seven consecutive Olympiads, winning seven consecutive team gold medals, five board gold medals, and one bronze board medal. Of note was his appearance on board one for the USSR in 1952, when the Soviets entered the event for the first time; Keres was the only Soviet team member with Olympiad experience (from his previous appearances for Estonia), and world champion Mikhail Botvinnik was not on the Soviet team. His four straight board gold medals from 1954–1960 is an Olympiad record. Although not selected after 1964, Keres served successfully as a team trainer with Soviet international teams for the next decade. Altogether, in 11 Olympiads, playing for both the USSR and Estonia (counting the unofficial Munich 1936 event), and in 161 games, Keres accumulated a brilliant total of (+97−13=51), for 76.1%. His detailed Soviet Olympiad results are:[16]

• Helsinki 1952, USSR board 1, 6½/12, team gold;
• Amsterdam 1954, USSR board 4, 13½/14 (+13−0=1), team gold, board gold, best overall score;
• Moscow 1956, USSR board 3, 9½/12 (+7−0=5), team gold, board gold;
• Munich 1958, USSR board 3, 9½/12 (+7−0=5), team gold, board gold;
• Leipzig 1960, USSR board 3, 10½/13 (+8−0=5), team gold, board gold;
• Varna 1962, USSR board 4, 9½/13 (+6−0=7), team gold, board bronze;
• Tel Aviv 1964, USSR board 4, 10/12 (+9−1=2), team gold, board gold.

Gedeon Barcza (left) vs. Keres, European Team Championship 1961

Keres also appeared three times for the Soviet Union in the European Team Championships, winning team and individual gold medals on all three occasions. He scored 14/18 (+10−0=8), for 77.8%. His detailed Euroteams results are:[17]

• Vienna 1957, USSR board 2, 3/5 (+1−0=4), team gold, board gold;
• Oberhausen 1961, USSR board 3, 6/8 (+4−0=4), team gold, board gold;
• Kapfenberg 1970, USSR board 8, 5/5 (+5−0=0), team gold, board gold.

Keres also represented the USSR in many international team matches, in Europe and the Americas, with great success. He represented Estonia on top board with distinction in Soviet team championships, contested between regions.[18]

Beginning with the Pärnu 1947 tournament, Keres made some significant contributions as a chess organizer in Estonia; this is an often overlooked aspect of his career.

Keres continued to play exceptionally well on the international circuit. He tied 1st–2nd at Hastings 1954–55 with Smyslov on 7/9 (+6−1=2). He dominated an internal Soviet training tournament at Pärnu 1955 with 9½/10. Keres placed 2nd at the 1955 Gothenburg Interzonal, behind David Bronstein, with 13½/20. Keres defeated Wolfgang Unzicker in a 1956 exhibition match at Hamburg by 6–2 (+4−0=4). He tied 2nd–3rd in the USSR Championship, Moscow 1957 (URS-ch24) with 13½/21 (+8−2=11), along with Bronstein, behind Mikhail Tal. Keres won Mar del Plata 1957 (15/17, ahead of Miguel Najdorf), and Santiago 1957 with 6/7, ahead of Alexander Kotov. He won Hastings 1957–58 (7½/9, ahead of Svetozar Gligorić). He was tied 3rd–4th at Zürich 1959, at 10½/15, along with Bobby Fischer, behind Tal and Gligorić. He placed tied 7–8th in the USSR Championship, Tbilisi 1959 (URS-ch26) with 10½/19, as Petrosian won. Keres was third at Stockholm 1959–60 with 7/9. He won at Pärnu 1960 with 12/15. He was the champion at Zürich 1961 (9/11, ahead of Petrosian). At the elite Bled 1961 event, Keres shared 3rd–5th places, on 12½/19 (+7−1=11), behind Mikhail Tal and Bobby Fischer.[19] In the USSR Championship, Baku 1961 (URS-ch29), Keres scored 11/20 for a shared 8–11th place, as Boris Spassky won. Keres shared first with World Champion Tigran Petrosian at the very strong 1963 Piatigorsky Cup in Los Angeles with 8½/14.[7]

Further tournament championships followed. He won Beverwijk 1964, with 11½/15, tied with Iivo Nei. He shared first place with World Champion Tigran Petrosian at Buenos Aires 1964, with 12½/17.[20] He won at Hastings 1964–65 with 8/9. He shared 1st–2nd places at Marianske Lazne 1965 on 11/15 with Vlastimil Hort. In the USSR Championship at Tallinn 1965 (URS-ch33), he scored 11/19 for 6th place, as Leonid Stein won. He won at Stockholm 1966–67 with 7/9. At Winnipeg 1967, he shared 3rd–4th places on 5½/9 as Bent Larsen and Klaus Darga won.[7]

Keres in Amsterdam (1971)

At Bamberg 1968, he won with 12/15, two points ahead of World Champion Tigran Petrosian. He was 2nd at Luhacovice 1969 with 10½/15, behind Viktor Korchnoi. At Tallinn 1969, he shared 2nd–3rd places on 9/13 as Stein won. At Wijk aan Zee 1969, he shared 3rd–4th places on 10½/15, as Geller and Botvinnik won. He won Budapest 1970 with 10/15, ahead of Laszlo Szabo. Also in 1970, Keres's 3:1 win over Ivkov on the tenth board gave victory to the Soviet team in the match vs Rest of the World. He shared 1st–2nd at Tallinn 1971 with Mikhail Tal on 11½/15. He shared 2nd–3rd at Pärnu 1971, on 9½/13, as Stein won. He shared 2nd–4th at Amsterdam 1971 with 9/13, as Smyslov won. He shared 3rd–5th places at Sarajevo 1972 on 9½/15, as Szabo won. He placed 5th at San Antonio 1972 on 9½/15, as Petrosian, Lajos Portisch, and Anatoly Karpov won.[7]

At Tallinn 1973, he shared 3rd–6th places on 9/15, as Mikhail Tal won. His last Interzonal was Petropolis 1973, where he scored 8/17 for a shared 12–13th place, as Henrique Mecking won. That same year, he made his last Soviet Championship appearance, at Moscow for URS-ch41, scoring 8/17 for a shared 9–12th place, as Boris Spassky won.

His health declined the next year, and he did not play any major events in 1974. Keres' last major tournament win was Tallinn 1975, ahead of Spassky and Friðrik Ólafsson, just a few months before his death.[21]

Paul Keres' tomb at Tallinn's Metsakalmistu cemetery

He died of a heart attack in Helsinki, Finland, at the age of 59 (it is often erroneusly reported that he died on the same date in Vancouver, Canada). His death occurred while returning to Estonia from a tournament in Vancouver, which he had won.[7] He was buried at Metsakalmistu cemetery in Tallinn. The Paul Keres Memorial Tournaments have been held annually mainly in Vancouver and Tallinn ever since.

Over 100,000 were in attendance at his funeral in Tallinn, Estonia; and FIDE President Max Euwe, his old friend and rival, was also present.[22]

A statue honouring him is located in Tõnismägi, Tallinn. A bronze statue of Keres was unveiled on his 100th birthday in his hometown Narva on 7 January 2016. There is also a street in Nõmme, a district of Tallinn, named after Keres.

The five kroons (5 krooni) Estonian banknote bore his portrait. Kroons have been replaced by the euro since 2011.

An annual international chess tournament has been held in Tallinn every other year since 1969. Keres won this tournament in 1971 and 1975. Starting in 1976 after Keres' death, it has been called the Paul Keres Memorial Tournament. There are also the annual Keres Memorial tournament held in Vancouver[23] and a number of chess clubs and festivals named after him.

In 2000, Keres was elected the Estonian Sportsman of the Century.

The World Chess Federation named 2016 as "The Year of Paul Keres".[24]

• 
  Statue in honour of Paul Keres in Narva
• 
  The former Estonian 5 krooni banknote with a portrait of Keres
• 
  USSR postage stamp issued in 1991 to honour Keres

The unofficial Chessmetrics system places Keres in the top 10 players in the world between approximately 1936 and 1965, and overall he had one of the highest winning percentages of all grandmasters in history. He has the seventh highest Chessmetrics 20-year average, from 1944 to 1963, behind five World Champions and Victor Korchnoi.[25]

He was one of few players to have plus records against Capablanca, Euwe and Tal, and he also had equal records against Smyslov, Petrosian and Anatoly Karpov. In his long career, he played 10 world champions. He won at least one game against all from Capablanca to Bobby Fischer (his two games with Karpov were drawn), making him one of only three players to beat nine undisputed world champions (the other two are Victor Korchnoi and Alexander Beliavsky). Other notable grandmasters against whom he had plus records include Fine, Flohr, Viktor Korchnoi, Efim Geller, Savielly Tartakower, Mark Taimanov, Milan Vidmar, Svetozar Gligorić, Isaac Boleslavsky, Efim Bogoljubov and Bent Larsen.

He wrote chess books that included a well-regarded, deeply annotated collection of his best games, Grandmaster of Chess ISBN 0-668-02645-6, The Art of the Middle Game (with Alexander Kotov) ISBN 0-486-26154-9, and Practical Chess Endings ISBN 0-7134-4210-7. All three books are still considered among the best of their kind for aspiring masters and experts. He also wrote several tournament books, including an account of the 1948 World Championship Match Tournament. He authored several openings treatises, often in German: Spanisch bis Französisch, Dreispringer bis Königsgambit ISBN 4871875431, and Vierspringer bis Spanisch. He contributed to the first volume, 'C', of the first edition of the Yugoslav-published Encyclopaedia of Chess Openings (ECO), which appeared in 1974. Keres also co-founded the Riga magazine Shakhmaty.

Keres made many important contributions to opening theory. Perhaps best-known is the Keres Attack against the Scheveningen Variation of the Sicilian Defence (1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 e6 6.g4), which was successfully introduced against Efim Bogolyubov at Salzburg 1943, and remains an important line. An original system on the Black side of the Closed Ruy Lopez (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6 5.0-0 Be7 6.Re1 b5 7.Bb3 d6 8.c3 0-0 9.h3 Na5 10.Bc2 c5 11.d4 Nd7) was introduced by Keres at the 1962 Candidates' tournament, and was popular for several years. He also popularized the Keres Defence (1.d4 e6 2.c4 Bb4+) and a system on the Black side of the English Opening that runs 1.c4 e5 2.Nc3 Nf6 3.g3 c6.

Keres published 180 problems and 30 studies, including a rook ending that won a first prize in 1947."[26]

Keres won top-class tournaments from the mid-1930s into the mid-1970s, a span of 40 years, and won major events in western Europe, eastern Europe, the Soviet Union, South America, and North America. Botvinnik, by contrast, never competed in the Americas during his career.

His rival Samuel Reshevsky said that Keres failed to become world champion because he lacked a killer instinct and "was too mild a person to give his all in order to defeat his opponents. He took everything, including his chess, philosophically. Keres is one of the nicest people that I have ever had the pleasure of meeting. With his friendly and sincere smile, he makes friends easily. He is goodnatured and kind. Yes, he loves chess, but being a human being is his first consideration. In addition to chess, Keres was interested in tennis, ping-pong, swimming, and bridge."[27]

• Keres, Paul; Kotov, Alexander (1964). The Art of the Middle Game. Penguin Books.
• Keres, Paul (1973). Practical Chess Endings. R.H.M. Press. ISBN 0-89058-028-6.
• Keres, Paul (1960). Keres' Best Games of Chess. Ishi Press. ISBN 4871875482.
• Keres, Paul (1960). Moderne Theorie der Schacheröffnungen Dreispringerspiel bis Königsgambit. Ishi Press. ISBN 4871875431.
• Keres, Paul (1949). Теория шахматных дебютов Открытые дебюты. Ishi Press. ISBN 4871875474.
• Keres, Paul (2012). The Early Games of Paul Keres Chess Grandmaster. Ishi Press. ISBN 4871875407.
• Keres, Paul (2012). The Middle Years of Paul Keres Chess Grandmaster. Ishi Press. ISBN 4871875415.
• Keres, Paul (2012). The Later Years of Paul Keres Chess Grandmaster. Ishi Press. ISBN 4871875423.

• Keres vs. Alexander Alekhine, Margate 1937, Ruy Lopez, Modern Steinitz Defence (C71), 1–0.[28] Here Keres outplayed Alekhine already in the first 15 moves. The game is crowned by two small combinations.
• Keres vs. José Raúl Capablanca, AVRO Amsterdam 1938, French Defence, Tarrasch Variation (C09), 1–0.[29] Almost unpredictable jumps of the white knight slowly destroy Black's position. A beautiful tactical game.
• Max Euwe vs. Keres, Amsterdam 1940 (match), Queen's Indian Defence, Old main line (E19), 0–1.[30] Black reveals a series of brilliant tactical surprise moves, concluding elegantly against the former world champion.
• Keres vs. Jaroslav Šajtar, Amsterdam 1954 (ol), Sicilian Defence, Najdorf Variation (B94), 1–0.[31] A typical Sicilian sacrifice on e6 leads to swift resignation.
• Keres vs. Mikhail Botvinnik, Moscow 1956 (Alekhine Memorial), Sicilian Defence, Classical Variation, Richter–Rauzer Attack (B63), 1–0.[32] Keres had a minus score against Botvinnik, but here he defeats the world champion in convincing positional style.
• Keres vs. Edgar Walther, Tel Aviv 1964, King's Indian Defence, Petrosian Variation, Keres Variation (E93), 1–0.[33] The game in which Keres introduced a new plan against the King's Indian: Bg5, h4, Nh2 and a sacrifice on g4.

Keres' tournament and match record:[21][34]

• Keres, Paul. Harry Golombek (ed.). Grandmaster of Chess: The Complete Games of Paul Keres. Arco, New York, 1977.
• Varnusz, Egon. Paul Keres' Best Games, Volume 1: Closed Games. Cadogan Chess, London, 1994, ISBN 1-85744-064-1.
• Paul Keres Best Games, Volume II: Semi-Open Games, by Egon Varnusz, London 1994, Cadogan Chess, ISBN 0-08-037139-6.
• Paul Keres: der Komponist = the Composer, by Alexander Hildebrand, F. Chlubna, Vienna, 1999.
• Peeter Järvelaid. Paul Keres ja Boris Meissner. – Pärnu Postimees, 8. jaanuar 2011, lk. 11. http://www.parnupostimees.ee/?id=368933

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Paul Keres.

• Paul Keres player profile and games at Chessgames.com
• Estonian banknotes
• Paul Keres at www.chesslady.com (in Czech)
• All Paul Keres' victories to download Archived 2012-01-31 at the Wayback Machine (Pgn format)
• 24. November 2015, FIDE, 2016 - Year of Paul Keres 2016 - Year of Paul Keres Archived 2016-03-04 at the Wayback Machine, fide.com