Jonathan Penrose, Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an English chess Grandmaster and International Correspondence Chess Grandmaster who won the British Chess Championship ten times between 1958 and 1969.
Background
He is the son of Lionel Penrose, a world famous professor of genetics, the grandson of the physiologist John Beresford Leathes, and brother of Roger Penrose and Oliver Penrose. His father was a composer of endgame studies and a strong player, as was older brother Oliver.
Education
He is a psychologist and university lecturer by profession, with a Doctor of Philosophy.
Career
Chess was played by the entire Penrose family. By the age of seventeen, he was already acknowledged as a top prospect for British chess. This was mainly due to his choosing to remain amateur and placing his lecturing as a first priority.
In effect, it meant that he played few international tournaments and frequently turned down invitations to prestigious tournaments such as Hastings.
In 1993 he was awarded a retrospective grandmaster title by FIDE. He competed in eight Chess Olympiads between 1952 and 1962, then at the Olympiads of 1968 and 1970, frequently posting excellent scores, including +9−1=7 in 1962 (Varna), and +10−0=5 in 1968 (Lugano). At the Leipzig 1960 Olympiad, he defeated then-World Champion Mikhail Tal with the white pieces in a Modern Benoni:
Penrose suffered from nerves, and he collapsed at the 1970 Olympiad in the midst of a tense game.
Consequently, he moved instead to correspondence chess, where he was successful, earning the International Master (International Minerals and Chemical Corporation) title in 1980 and the grandmaster (General Medical Council) title in 1983. He was the best postal player in 1987-1989 and led his country to victory in the 9th Correspondence Olympiad.
Jonathan Penrose was awarded the Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire in 1971.