In this survey paper, we describe how strands of work that are important in two different fields, matrix theory and complex function theory, have come together in some work on fast computational algorithms for matrices with what we call displacement structure. In particular, a fast triangularization procedure can be developed for such matrices, generalizing in a striking way an algorithm presented by Schur (1917) [J. Reine Angew. Math., 147 (1917), pp. 205–232] in a paper on checking when a power series is bounded in the unit disc. This factorization algorithm has a surprisingly wide range of significant applications going far beyond numerical linear algebra. We mention, among others, inverse scattering, analytic and unconstrained rational interpolation theory, digital filter design, adaptive filtering, and state-space least-squares estimation.