Getting into Harvard

You'll find another such globe, made by the legendary Flemish cartographer Gerard Mercator, at Pusey Library, back in Harvard's New Yard. The library holds both the Harvard Map Collection (where the current exhibit honors pioneering mapmaker Henry F. Walling), and the Harvard Theatre Collection, a trove of playbills, posters, scripts, and theater paraphernalia. The current exhibition chronicles productions of George Balanchine ballets. Check out the model of London's Globe Theatre to imagine playgoing in Shakespeare's day.

Although held in Pusey, the Theatre Collection is part of Houghton Library, Harvard's repository of rare books. Stop in for the Friday afternoon tour, which we think of as an annotated visit. Through April 26, you'll begin with the exhibition of recent acquisitions, which range from illuminated medieval manuscripts to the first draft manuscript of Gore Vidal's "Myra Breckinridge." After visits with Emily Dickinson and John Keats, you'll conclude in the inner sanctum of the Hyde Suite, which holds works written by, owned by, or written about the seminal lexicographer Dr. Samuel Johnson.

You don't have to end your Harvard forays when the sun goes down. The Harvard Film Archive screens foreign and classic films almost every evening except Wednesday year-round. If you prefer live action over celluloid, the American Repertory Theatre performs at Loeb Drama Center and the intimate Zero Arrow Theater.

Cambridge-based freelance writers Patricia Harris (Class of '77) and David Lyon can be reached at harris.lyon@verizon.net.