Izbrannjie Etjudji S. Kaminera, M. Liburkina Add to Watch List Watching View Watchlist >

Fizkultura i Sport, Moskva 1981, in Russian language, paperback, 160 p., condition: very good, never read, 180 grams.

Introduction by M.M. Botvinnik. 167+ studies.

Kaminer was one of the cornerstones of Soviet endgame study composition. From 1932 to 1938 he headed the endgame studies department of the magazine 64 together with Somov-Nassimowitsch. From 1924 he published 65 chess studies, 27 of which received awards, including 15 prize winners. He possessed a rare sense of harmony, his chess studies are natural and seem to be endgames from games. In the battle between minor characters, he composed a series of astute works.

Botvinnik: "It was autumn 1937. I played the match for the USSR championship against Löwenfisch in Moscow. An unexpected phone call and Serjoscha Kaminer appears in the room at the Hotel National. 'Here in the notebook,' he says, 'are all my studies, some of which have not yet been fully completed. Take her. I fear they will be lost to me.’ His premonition came true. I kept this booklet for a long time. In the 1950s I notified our composers that I had Kaminer's notebook. And now Kaminer’s studies are in this book.”   

At the age of thirty, Kaminer fell victim to Stalin's Great Terror. On August 17, 1938, he was arrested and accused of belonging to a counter-revolutionary terrorist organization. On September 27, 1938, he was sentenced to death by firing squad by the Military Department of the Supreme Court of the USSR and was shot on the same day. On July 11, 1956, Kaminer was rehabilitated by the Military Department of the USSR Supreme Court.