Houghton Library

Dear Houghton Library:
I get that you take your mandate to preserve your valuable and rare collections for the future seriously. Very seriously. I get that there are nefarious evil-​doers who steal priceless stuff from rare books, so you must be vigilant. And I get that you have Awesome Rare Stuff. But, come on, dudes. You are a library. People who use libraries – especially rare book collections – tend to have research materials that they maybe want to use while consulting your books. In other words, maybe a file folder? With notes, papers, print-​outs to compare things? Maybe just some notebook paper? And, I think you’ve given up the asinine attempt at prohibiting people from bringing in their own paper (yes, this actually happened a while back: one was not allowed to bring in paper. To a library).
And, may I say, your reproduction services department blows. Well, they do very good reproductions, but considering the price you charge, I kind of expected the CD of my TIFFs to be lined in platinum. I know times are tough everywhere, but, come on dudes, you’re Harvard. I’m a poor scholar. Cut me some slack, will you?
Your collections are 5 star. The irritation of working here is not. Luckily the faculty club is across the street where you can dull the pain with a cheapish martini and great free snacks in the Conservatory.