About the Author

Kiyoshi Kosugi was born in 1939 in Tokyo into a large, go-playing family. His parents and all six of his brothers and sisters know how to play go, and three of them---his father, mother, and younger brother---are professional go players. Under his father's tutelage, he became a professional shodan in 1957, reached 2-dan the next year, and 3-dan the year after that. In 1967 he took second place in the second division of the Oteai tournament, which determines a professional player's rank, and was promoted to 5-dan. In 1979 he came in second in the 23rd Prime Minister's Cup. He became 8-dan in 1991. Besides go, he likes to read and play mah jong. He lives with his wife and family in Chiba Prefecture. James Davies was born in 1945 in Philadelphia. He graduated from Oberlin College in 1967 and entered graduate school at the University of Washington, only to have a mathematics professor interest him in the game of go. In 1970 he came to Japan, where his go playing has advanced to the amateur 6-dan level.