Anya Sun Corke (born 12 September 1990 in

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

, USA) is an American-born English

chess Chess is a board game for two players, called White and Black, each controlling an army of chess pieces in their color, with the objective to checkmate the opponent's king. It is sometimes called international chess or Western chess to disti ...

player holding the title of

Woman Grandmaster FIDE titles are awarded by the international chess governing body FIDE (''Fédération Internationale des Échecs'') for outstanding performance. The highest such title is Grandmaster (GM). Titles generally require a combination of Elo rating and ...

(WGM). She played for

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China ( abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delt ...

, where she was the top ranked chess player, until 2009.

Career

Corke earned the WGM title with her performance in the 36th Chess Olympiad, playing for the Hong Kong men's team. She was the 2004, 2005, 2006 and 2008 Hong Kong National Champion (for men and women), one of the youngest national champions ever at the age of 13 years and 9 months. She was the British Junior Under-11 Champion in 2002 and the Under-12 Champion in 2003, the first girl to win either of these age groups. In 2004, she became joint British U-14 Champion. In December 2004, she won the Asian Youth Girls U-14 Championship in

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, borde ...

. In August 2005, she jointly won with Alisa Melekhina and Abby Marshall the second annual Susan Polgar National Invitational for Girls under-19. Corke represented the England Women's team at the 2012 Chess Olympiad in

Istanbul Istanbul ( , ; tr, İstanbul ), formerly known as Constantinople ( grc-gre, Κωνσταντινούπολις; la, Constantinopolis), is the List of largest cities and towns in Turkey, largest city in Turkey, serving as the country's economic, ...

Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a list of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolia, Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with ...

, and the 2013 European Team Championship in

Warsaw Warsaw ( pl, Warszawa, ), officially the Capital City of Warsaw,, abbreviation: ''m.st. Warszawa'' is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the River Vistula in east-central Poland, and its population is officia ...

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populous ...

Personal life and education

In 2013, Corke graduated from Wellesley College summa cum laude with a B.A. in Russian and Philosophy. In 2014, she started a Ph.D. program in Slavic Languages and Literatures at

Yale University Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the wo ...

. She obtained an M.A. and M.Phil Slavic Languages and Literatures (specializing in Russian). In 2019, Corke started the J.D. program at

Yale Law School Yale Law School (Yale Law or YLS) is the law school of Yale University, a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. It was established in 1824 and has been ranked as the best law school in the United States by '' U.S. News & Worl ...

. Corke is married and lives in the United States with her husband.

Media

Her photograph was misappropriated by supporters of

Barisan Nasional The National Front ( ms, Barisan Nasional; abbrev: BN) is a political coalition of Malaysia that was founded in 1973 as a coalition of centre-right and right-wing political parties. It is also the third largest political coalition with 30 ...

, the ruling political party of

Malaysia Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federation, federal constitutional monarchy consists of States and federal territories of Malaysia, thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two r ...

, to depict the victim in a controversy alleging sexual misconduct by the son of

Lim Guan Eng Lim Guan Eng (; born 8 December 1960) is a Malaysian politician and accountant from the Democratic Action Party (DAP), a component party of the Pakatan Harapan (PH) coalition who has served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Bagan, Member of t ...

, who is one of the leaders of

DAP DAP or Dap may refer to: Science * DAP (gene), human gene that encodes death-associated proteins, which mediate programmed cell death * Diamidophosphate, phosphorylating compound * Diaminopimelic acid, amino acid derivative of lysine * Diamin ...

, a Malaysian opposition party. DAP and their supporters then contacted Anya Corke to obtain an official denial that she knows Lim Guan Eng's son; she confirmed that the allegations were false, and that the photo was used without her knowledge or consent. The original photo used in this controversy was stolen from an article on the website ChessBase News, and had the chess board cropped out.

References

External links

* * * * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Corke, Anya 1990 births Living people Chess woman grandmasters Chess Olympiad competitors Hong Kong chess players English chess players American emigrants to Hong Kong