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The New Yorker's move to the Conde Nast building in Times Square, planned for the summer, has ignited a feud between unlikely opponents: a prolific author and the New York Public Library.
Ved Mehta, the author of 22 books and a staff writer at The New Yorker from 1961 to 1994, has long used the library as a research site, despite his blindness; he has assistants who read to him in his private office at The New Yorker.
He was allowed to keep the office even though he was no longer an employee of the magazine (he likes to say he was ''terminated'' by Tina Brown in 1994). But he will not get office space in The New Yorker's new, smaller quarters in the Times Square building. A spokeswoman for the magazine, Perri Dorset, said that there would be room only for regular contributors to the magazine.
When Mr. Mehta heard that the library, as part of its renovation, was creating 15 private rooms for scholars, he was curious about the new spaces.
''I went to apply for an office, and the answer came back no,'' he said.
Carolina Oyama, manager of public relations for the library, said that the private rooms were apportioned out by the Center for Scholars and Writers, a new program that has been endowed by a $15 million grant from Dorothy and Lewis Cullman. The space is open only to scholars who apply for specific study projects and is available during the course of an academic year, Ms. Oyama said.
Mr. Mehta, who is the recipient of a MacArthur grant and two Guggenheim fellowships, said last week that he had met with Paul LeClerc, the president of the New York Public Library. Mr. LeClerc, he said, was ''sympathetic,'' but the meeting had little result. Mr. Mehta said he believed that other writers of his stature had received adequate work space when they asked for it, and he had not.
Mr. Mehta said he would sue the library -- if it did not provide him with ''proper facilities'' -- for discriminating against him as a blind person.
Ms. Oyama said that the library was not acting illegally by denying Mr. Mehta a private office.
Mr. LeClerc said that there were semi-private accommodations for writers who had pending book contracts.
''And as we go through the rest of the renovation process, we will be sure to accommodate visually impaired writers,'' he said.
Mr. Mehta is unswayed in his mission.
''I've written 22 books, I was a staff writer at the New Yorker from 1961 to 1994, I've never had a sabbatical and I've worked seven days a week,'' he said. ''I don't understand the priorities of this civilization.''
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