All that saying that knowledge takes up no space sounds like nonsense or a tall tale to Mendel Uminer, a New York resident.
Culture does take up space and, contrary to popular belief, it can be a nuisance and a constraint. Because, as is also popularly said, culture weighs, and that burden has had a direct influence on the fate of this New Yorker and even his community.
“Uminer slept on a mattress on the floor, surrounded by novels with dog-eared pages from use”
How much do 10,000 books weigh? According to estimates, the figure could range between three and ten tons.
Mendel Uminer, 31, received an eviction notice and ended up out of what was his ideal home. The reason was not the usual non-payment, something this tenant kept up to date, but precisely the literal burden of his wisdom, where he found no resources for his housing problem.
“I’m always reading. I read to extract knowledge. I need every one of the books I have. My library is my manual for life,” he confessed to The New York Times. But all that knowledge did not help him face the crisis he suffered when he received the eviction order from his apartment, in the Upper East Side of Manhattan, one block from Central Park.
The landlord informed him a few months ago that due to that accumulation of volumes he was “breaching a substantial obligation of his lease agreement,” according to the letter sent to him by the building manager. “He keeps the dwelling in a state of extreme disorder, allows the excessive accumulation of books in the property, and is creating a fire hazard due to the excessive accumulation of combustible volumes in the dwelling,” it emphasized.
“I open this letter,” Uminer recalled, “and they tell me that my books represent a fire hazard and that I will have to leave if I don’t get rid of them,” he confessed to the Times.
For a year, since he moved into that apartment, and until receiving that letter, Uminer, a young Jewish scholar and writer, led an idyllic existence in that 56 m2 temple of erudition.
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The young writer led an idyllic life in his 56-square-meter temple of erudition, where he also worked as a freelance Hebrew translator
From the description in the cited article, tall stacks of books on Jewish themes lined the walls. Piles of copies on film criticism and opera history filled the pre-war apartment’s bathroom. Stacks of plays and poetry collections blocked a window; and “Uminer slept on a mattress on the floor, surrounded by novels with dog-eared pages from use.” In that paradise of ideas, waking around noon, “he spent afternoons reclining on his chaise longue, bathed in sunlight, devouring works by Yiddish writers like Chaim Grade and critics like Edmund Wilson, feeding his mind while the city buzzed on the other side of his windows.”
In his daily life, he worked as a freelance Hebrew translator and used the apartment as the headquarters of his fledgling literary magazine, Notarikon Review. He organized meetings in his apartment that gained some fame in certain circles of New York’s literary bohemia. Writers aspiring to make their way drank beer among the teetering stacks of books while discussing international politics and Greek poetry.
As the days went by, the stacks of books kept growing as he expanded his collection with finds from second-hand stores, booksellers, and purchases received from eBay. He did not consider himself a compulsive hoarder, something very typical of being a New Yorker, although, apparently, the building managers thought otherwise.
Uminer ignored the manager’s warning, so the eviction process began. Then he decided to defend himself in court.
Born into a Hasidic family in Brooklyn, he experienced Manhattan’s literary cafés, removed his kippah, and secularized. He enrolled in film and philosophy at Columbia University. He went to Paris following a girlfriend, with whom he broke up. Once he spent his savings, he returned to New York.
After months of legal back and forth, Uminer resigned himself and moved out with the weight of wisdom on his back.
Mendel Uminer
“My library is my manual for life”
Mendel Uminer, a 31-year-old Jewish scholar and writer, moved to an apartment in the Upper East Side, near Central Park, where in his 56 m2 he found a paradise of wisdom. “My library is my manual for life,” he said to emphasize the need to accumulate so many books.
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