The Sharper Word: A Mod Reader [Paperback]

Paolo Hewitt (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 2000

Paolo Hewitt, celebrated rock journalist and biographer of Oasis, The Jam and The Small Faces, has collected some of the best writings ever on mod: the music, the fashions, and the entire way of life.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

As portrayed in the Who rock opera Quadrophenia, the mods were a working-class British youth cult in the mid-1960s preoccupied with mohair suits, dance clubs, scooters, and amphetamines. Rock journalist Hewitt borrows short snippets from Richard Barnes's standard Mods! (Plexus Pub., 1994), fiction by Tom Wolfe and Samuel Selvon, scholarly accounts by Stanley Cohen and Dick Hebdige, and oral histories. More obscure mod-related pieces, including an interview with top mod Pete Meaden, a 1960s article by fashion queen Mary Quant, and an unpublished eyewitness account by mod pioneer Irish Jack are also included. Though he somewhat neglects the mod drive for upward mobility after the lingering postwar economic squalor, Hewitt provides marvelous descriptions of mod trappingsDthe fashion, the music, the drugs, the clubsDthat clearly demonstrate the roots of Britpop and Austin Powers. Recommended for anyone interested in social history, youth movements, Carnaby Street, and rock'n'roll.DDave Szatmary. Univ. of Washington
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From the Publisher

As well as new essays from Hewitt, The Sharp Word rediscovers impossible to find writing by Tom Wolfe, Mary Quant, Tony Parsons and Nik Cohn. Going beyond the surface cliches, Hewitt's hugely readable collection fully documents one of the most misunderstood cultural movements of the post-war era.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: Helter Skelter Publishing (March 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1900924102
• ISBN-13: 978-1900924108
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 5.7 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,062,214 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A sharp insight, superbly done, April 15, 2000

By 

"nashie_san" - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Sharper Word: A Mod Reader (Paperback)

One of the finest books I have read in a long time, a very sharp look at the mod culture of which I was one, this book took me back to a time I had enjoyed and lived, I would recomend this book to any one who has followed the mod culture through all its rebirths over the last 40 years. If I had any critisism it would be a lack of photographs but this doesnt detract from the content of the book I have read it three times now, the first reading was accomplished in one sitting I could not put the book down.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Interesting, but Badly Designed, January 10, 2001

By 

A. Ross (Washington, DC) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Sharper Word: A Mod Reader (Paperback)

This collection of 31 excerpts from various works of music and cultural journalism, biography, and fiction seeks to shed light on the little-understood "mod" subculture. Hewitt has done well to seek out the relevant passages from a wide range of sources, although Richard Barnes' "Mods!", Nik Cohn's "Ball the Wall" and Johnathan Green's "Days in the Life: Voices from the English Underground 1961-1971" are each excerpted three times. The first-hand accounts of living the mod life are fairly uniform in their descriptions and as a whole tend to expose the mod subculture as a fairly empty narcissistic enterprise--albeit a sharp one. Only in "Ace Face" (and former Who crony) Pete Meaden's rambling 1978 NME interview is there any sense of a larger purpose, but then he comes across as a bit of a whacked-out dreamer compared to all the other sartorial hipsters. Still, worth reading if you're interested in the history of the mod subculture. It's a shame the publishers didn't devote any time or effort to the look of the book. From weak cover to atrocious typography, it exhibits none of the attention to detail that characterized the essence of mod style.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Cool collection, August 16, 2007

By 

Zelie Nic (Pittsburgh) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Sharper Word: A Mod Reader (Paperback)

Its a cool collection of interviews, newstories, book excerpts, etc. Really concentrates more on peakcockish mods than hard mods. Definatley makes those early mods extremely fanatical.