This book offers 450 endgame studies covering a span of 160 years from 1837 to 1997. The author, Anatoly Kuznetsov (1932-2000), was a well-known composer in his own right, and a number of his studies are also included.
The endgame study in Russia has followed two schools of thought. On the one hand we have the positional and analytical school with composers like Kasparian and Nadareishvili as its main exponents. On the other hand we have the romantic school with votaries like Korolkov, Mitrofanov and Pogosyants.
The work of the new generation of composers like Kralin, Bazlov and Pervakov, however, is not easy to label and categorize as their studies show a synthesis of both styles. In their case imagination is tempered by realism.