Leonard Lopate Visits To Help Fight For Hevesi Library

In his introduction on Sunday next to a panel of Jewish authors and filmmakers, Leonard Lopate bemoaned the 92nd Street Y's library closing last year and congratulated the for keeping theirs alive.

As part of its fall program, Lopate moderated a convivial discussion on the recent burst of literature and film from or about Orthodox Jews in America. Writers Tova Mirvis and Joshua Halberstam and filmmaker Pearl Gluck bounced off each other on the current state and various shades of Jewish orthodoxy, and its unique cultural presence in the United States.

All three grew up in orthodox communities — distinctly different ones — and each spoke at length to the "anxiety of writing about a community," as Mirvis put it.

The event, officially dubbed the 14th Annual Authors Café, has been an important facet of the CQY arts program and its coveted Rabbi Simon Hevesi Jewish Heritage Library, said Peggy Kurtz, the library's principal librarian and organizer for the event.

This year, the Hevesi Library lost its public funding — about $50,000 — because of cuts to the New York State Budget, according to Rick Lewis, associate executive director of the Central Queens Y. This year's authors café doubled as a fundraiser to keep the library open for the Forest Hills community and beyond.

Because of the fundraising effort and the topic she addressed, Kurtz said "the [panelists] were unusually eager and generous to devote some of their time to come and talk here."

"There are secular Jews here, orthodox too. This is for the religious and non-religious," said Kurtz. She also called the speakers "objective and stimulating.

After the talk, Gluck called the audience of 120-plus people "deliciously diverse." Associated with the Little Neck Y, the event drew a broad array of visitors mostly from Jewish communities all over Brooklyn, Queens and Long Island, as well as the Bronx.

"When you look at an event like this, it kind of looks like a group of pretty similar people, but it's after, when you talk to them you find they have very diverse backgrounds and experiences," said Gluck.

Gluck was also very pleased with the other panelists. "You know it's good when you meet afterwards and want to collaborate with them on future projects," she said with a nod and smile from Halbserstam behind her.

One of the pleased audience members, Edith Friedlander, said she was relieved the library remains open and called Kurtz "an excellent librarian."

Both Kurtz and Lewis said they were pleased with the money they had raised from the event, but would not give a dollar figure. Kurtz said it was the most successful fundraiser they had ever had.

When it came time for the panelists to smile for the cameras with Kurtz, Lopate deadpanned: "Everybody say 'Kosher Pizza.'"