Houghton Library, Harvard’s principal rare book and special collections library and one of the world’s premier research institutions, marks its 75th anniversary this year. Celebrations, held throughout 2017, include a collaboration with the Harvard Film Archive on a series of seven screenings, five this spring and two in the fall. Since Houghton opened in 1942, the library’s holdings have been the basis for countless significant projects, from academia to Hollywood—a fact that is hardly surprising, given the range and depth of the library’s world-renowned collections. What may surprise some is the library’s close ties with popular culture. The Houghton at 75 screening series features films inspired by the library’s collections—from the “semi-final draft” manuscript of Billy Budd (one item in the library’s incomparable Melville collection), to Emily Dickinson’s hand-sewn “fascicles” of her poetry manuscripts, to various drafts of The Miracle Worker, for both the stage and film versions, in the William Gibson archive.

A Houghton curator will introduce each film, describing the specific holdings on which the film is based, as well as to set the larger literary, political or historical context.