Jose Mindlin, Jewish bibliophile, dies in Brazil

A Jewish bibliophile who owned the largest private library in Latin America has died.

Jose Mindlin died Sunday in Brazil. He was 95.

Born to Ukrainian parents, Jose Mindlin owned over 38,000 books and was a member of the prestigious Brazilian Academy of Letters. In 2006, he donated about half of his collection to the University of Sao Paulo, mostly on topics related to Brazilian studies. A building will be built in the university’s campus specifically to maintain this massive library, and will be named after the Guita and Jose Mindlin Foundation.

After retiring from the business world, Mindlin was able to dedicate his time to a passion he had since he was 13 years old: collecting and preserving rare books. The first rare edition in his collection was “Discours sur l’Histoire Universelle,” by Jacques-Benigne Bossuet, published in 1740.

Mindlin had occupied several public positions in the cultural field in Sao Paulo, including that of secretary of culture.

“He was a giant of the Brazilian culture. His legacy is the library he left, the result of a life dedicated to the books. Today it’s an asset of all Brazilians,” said Sao Paulo Mayor Gilbero Kassab.

Henry Sobel, emeritus rabbi of Latin America’s largest Jewish congregation, the 2,000-family Congregacao Israelita Paulista, declared that Mindlin’s life was book itself.
 
“He was a righteous man who could see ethics in politics and culture. I felt so little when I was in his library. His greatest book was called Jose Mindlin,” Sobel said.