The
New York Public Library has been referenced numerous times in popular culture. Most of these depictions show the
NYPL's flagship branch, an official national and city landmark.
In The Wiz (1978), one of the stone lions adorning the front steps of the NYPL comes to life, and joins Dorothy and her dog, Toto, on their journey out of Oz. [4]
It is featured prominently in Ghostbusters (1984), when three of the main characters encounter the ghost of librarian Eleanor Twitty. Her origins and the library's prominence are explored in the video game sequel, Ghostbusters: The Video Game. In May 2010, the library invited comedy group
Improv Everywhere to put on a brief performance in the main reading room based on Ghostbusters, as a promotional stunt.[5] In the sequel Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire (2024), it revealed that the library had archived a cursed phonograph cylinder recorded by the
gentlemen's club Manhattan Adventurers Society in 1904 that would free the god Garraka from captivity.
A thinly disguised NYPL is the workplace of a librarian with access to many mythical objects imparting magical powers for fighting evil, in The Librarian TV-series and film franchise starring
Noah Wyle. The first of the series is The Librarian: Quest for the Spear (2004).
NYPL is featured in the film version of
Sex and the City (2008) as the location of Carrie and Mr. Big's wedding.
NYPL is featured in Oblivion (2013), starring
Tom Cruise, shown as a rubble remnant of post-Apocalypse war.
Cynthia Ozick's 2004 novel, Heir to the Glimmering World, set just prior to
World War II, involves a refugee-scholar from Hitler's Germany researching the
Karaite Jews at NYPL.
Akimi Yoshida's Banana Fish as one of the places the protagonist, Ash Lynx, enjoys visiting when he needs to be alone with his thoughts. In Garden of Light, it is stated that Eiji Okumura avoids the library due to events which occurred at the end of Banana Fish.
In
Fredric Brown's What Mad Universe the protagonist goes to the New York Public Library (rather, to its analogue in an
alternate history timeline) in an effort to make sense of the strange world in which he found himself.
Adam Lee's dystopian "The Commonwealth", featuring "The Last Stand of the Librarians" (
[1]).
False Values by
Ben Aaronovitch, the eighth book in the
Rivers of London series reveals NYPL to be a major force in the North American magical hierarchy.
Additionally, excerpts from several of the many
memoirs and essays mentioning the New York Public Library are included in the anthology Reading Rooms (1991), including reminiscences by
Alfred Kazin,
Henry Miller, and Kate Simon.
Poetry
Both branches and the central building have been immortalized in numerous poems, including:
Paul Blackburn's "Graffiti" (in The Collected Poems of Paul Blackburn [1985])
Richard Eberhart's "Reading Room, The New York Public Library" (in his Collected Poems, 1930–1986 [1988])
Lawrence Ferlinghetti's "Library Scene, Manhattan" (in his How to Paint Sunlight [2001])
Arthur Guiterman's "The Book Line; Rivington Street Branch, New York Public Library" (in his Ballads of Old New York [1920])
Muriel Rukeyser's "Nuns in the Wind" (in The Collected Poems of Muriel Rukeyser [2005])
Susan Thomas' "New York Public Library" (the anthology American Diaspora [2001])
E.B. White's "Reading Room" (Poems and Sketches of E.B. White [1981])
Aaron Zeitlin's poem about going to the library, included in his 2-volume Ale lider un poemes [Complete Lyrics and Poems] (1967 and 1970)
Music
NYPL is featured in the 1972
Alice Cooper rock/pop video for Elected (1972).
Television
The library is the inspiration for the Busterfield Library in Between the Lions.
It is the setting for much of "The Persistence of Memory", the eleventh part of Carl Sagan's Cosmos TV series.
It was shown in the pilot episode of the ABC series Traveler as the Drexler Museum of Art.
In the second episode of Girl Meets World ("Girl Meets Boy"), Cory gives to the class an assignment to do in the New York Public Library.
The penultimate and final episodes of Season 2 of Person of Interest feature scenes which take place in New York Public Library, and is the location of the Machine's godmode phonecall after it was crashed by a virus.
In the Season One episode of The Newsroom "The Blackout Part I: Tragedy Porn", Charlie Skinner meets an anonymous NSA whistleblower in the NYPL to discuss the NSA's surveillance programs.
In the fifth-season finale episode of Once Upon a Time "An Untold Story", Henry asks Emma, Regina, Rumple, and Violet to make a wish and throw a penny in the fountain outside the library in hopes of restoring magic to get his family home. After seeing that it works, Henry stands on a pedestal by one of the lion statues outside the library and asks others to believe in magic again and throw pennies in the fountain. People soon do it and Emma and Regina soon see that what Henry is doing is actually restoring magic, allowing his family to come home through in a portal in the fountain made by everyone's wishes. When everyone sees what is happening, Henry is sad due to the people believing it was a magic trick, but Emma soon tells him that he made the city to actually believe in magic.