Children who play chess develop the ability to concentrate for extended periods, think ahead and solve problems. They learn to win and lose graciously.
The M V Anderson Chess Collection at the Victorian State Library has been a valuable resource for Australian players for more than half a century.
With over 13,000 volumes, the M V Anderson Chess Collection is the largest chess collection in the Southern Hemisphere. Chess resources include books on strategy, chess in film and art, novels featuring chess, the history of chess and overviews of openings such as the Sicilian Dragon, Complete Hedgehog and more.
The collection is recognised by the Oxford Companion to Chess (1992) as one of the three largest public chess collections in the world, the other two being the J.G. White Collection in the Cleveland Public Library and the Van der Linde-Niemeijer Collection in the National Library of the Netherlands.
The M V Anderson Chess Collection is based on the personal collection of Magnus Victor Anderson (1884-1966), a Melbourne accountant and keen chess player. Initially Anderson started his collection as a player’s working collection, but as his collection grew he also began to collect the early chess works that now give his collection such historical depth. In 1955 Anderson offered his chess books to the then Public Library of Victoria. At that time he had a collection of about 1,500 books. Anderson himself looked after the collection – he added to it, catalogued it, and answered requests for games. By the time he died in 1966 the collection numbered over 6,000 volumes.
The M V Anderson Collection has its own place within the Victorian State where reading and study is possible, with chessboards provided for assistance. More than a thousand, generally recent, publications are on display but older books, journals, chess columns and tournament bulletins are easily accessible on request, although some rare books are only viewable with supervision. Chess game sets and open access books from the Chess Collection are available in the La Trobe Reading Room.
The Melbourne collection is also well funded. Recent books and magazines are added frequently; the library buys most chess books published in English and major works in other languages.
The Library has two large chess outdoor chess sets that are set up on decal boards outside the library on the forecourt from 10am to 5pm. Chess on the forecourt was established in Summer 2014 to provide an alternative space to engage new players.