Larisa Ilinichna Volpert (born March 30, 1926) is a Russia

Russia

Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

n chess

Chess

Chess is a two-player board game played on a chessboard, a square-checkered board with 64 squares arranged in an eight-by-eight grid. It is one of the world's most popular games, played by millions of people worldwide at home, in clubs, online, by correspondence, and in tournaments.Each player...

 Woman Grandmaster. She was three times Soviet women's chess champion

Women's Soviet Chess Championship

The Women's Soviet Chess Championship was played in the Soviet Union from 1927 through 1989 to determine the women's chess national champion.-List of winners:Winners of more titles* 5 titles : Valentina Borisenko, Nona Gaprindashvili...

 (1954, 1958, and 1959).

Born in Leningrad

Saint Petersburg

Saint Petersburg is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea...

, she learned chess from her older brother and received chess instruction at the Leningrad Pioneers Palace

Pioneers Palace

Young Pioneer Palaces or Palaces of Young Pioneers and Schoolchildren were youth centers designated for the creative work, sport training and extracurricular activities of Young Pioneers and other schoolchildren...

.
In 1947, she tied for first at the Leningrad Women's Championship. She played her first USSR Women's Championship in 1949 and finished equal fifth. In 1954, she won her first USSR Women's Championship.
She scored 2–0 against Nina Hrušková-Bělská in the 1954 USSR v. Czechoslovakia

Czechoslovakia

Czechoslovakia or Czecho-Slovakia was a sovereign state in Central Europe which existed from October 1918, when it declared its independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, until 1992...

 match.
In 1958 she shared the USSR Women's Championship title, and in 1959 she won for the third time, her second outright victory.

Volpert earned the Woman International Master title in 1954 and the Woman Grandmaster title in 1977.
She has a degree in philology

Philology

Philology is the study of language in written historical sources; it is a combination of literary studies, history and linguistics.Classical philology is the philology of Greek and Classical Latin...

 from Leningrad University

Saint Petersburg State University

Saint Petersburg State University is a Russian federal state-owned higher education institution based in Saint Petersburg and one of the oldest and largest universities in Russia....

 and is Professor Emerita of philology

Philology

Philology is the study of language in written historical sources; it is a combination of literary studies, history and linguistics.Classical philology is the philology of Greek and Classical Latin...

 at the University of Tartu

University of Tartu

The University of Tartu is a classical university in the city of Tartu, Estonia. University of Tartu is the national university of Estonia; it is the biggest and highest-ranked university in Estonia...

, Estonia

Estonia

Estonia , officially the Republic of Estonia , is a state in the Baltic region of Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland, to the west by the Baltic Sea, to the south by Latvia , and to the east by Lake Peipsi and the Russian Federation . Across the Baltic Sea lies...

.

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