Robert Darnton quotes

The fact that I spend a lot of time in the 18th century doesn't mean I'm not concerned with the 21st. (Robert Darnton)
People sometimes announce that we have entered 'the information age' as if information did not exist in other times. I think that every age was an age of information, each in its own way and according to the available media. View quote
Robert Darnton
I believe we should celebrate new possibilities of combining the printed codex with electronic technology... The information ecology is getting richer, not thinner. View quote
Robert Darnton
We need librarians who can handle this tremendous jumble of information that is in cyberspace. View quote
Robert Darnton
People think that when you use Google you're finding exactly what you need, but really, you need expert help. View quote
Robert Darnton
My work has taken me from historical research to involvement in electronic publishing ventures to the directorship of the Harvard University Libraries. View quote
Robert Darnton
I would not minimize the digital divide, which separates the computerized world from the rest, nor would I underestimate the importance of traditional books. View quote
Robert Darnton
The American revolutionaries believed in the power of the word. But they had only word of mouth and the printing press. We have the Internet. View quote
Robert Darnton
I arrived from Harvard, where I had studied philosophy and the history of ideas, with a bias toward literature and formal thought. View quote
Robert Darnton
As president of the American Historical Association, I started a programme to make dissertations into e-books in 1999. Before I knew it, I was involved in other electronic projects. Harvard invited me to become director of the libraries in 2007. View quote
Robert Darnton
I worked for a brief spell as a journalist, but soon I discovered that I didn't want to be a journalist - I wanted to be a historian. (Robert Darnton)
As a graduate student at Oxford in 1963, I began writing about books in revolutionary France, helping to found the discipline of book history. I was in my academic corner writing about Enlightenment ideals when the Internet exploded the world of academic communication in the 1990s. View quote
Robert Darnton
Digital data are more fragile than printed material. View quote
Robert Darnton
It's important to make clear to all the schools at Harvard the central role of the library. View quote
Robert Darnton
The notion of 'history from below' hit the history profession in England very hard around the time I came to Oxford in the early 1960s. View quote
Robert Darnton

Robert Darnton

Robert Darnton - Image
Photo: Robert Darnton, CC BY 3.0
Occupation: American Historian
Born: May 10, 1939
Quotes count: 15