Quango lingo: Bonfire of the vanities, and other inanities

The dramatic metaphorical idea of a bonfire of quangos has its origins in the very real notion of burning examples of excess. The phrase is perhaps more commonly associated with Tom Wolfe's 1987 novel The Bonfire of the Vanities – a story of greed played out by New York yuppies, subsequently made into a film starring Tom Hanks and Bruce Willis – but Wolfe took the title from the Florentine practice of literally torching anything associated with luxury. The most famous burning took place in 1497, when followers of Girolamo Savonarola – a monk with firm beliefs in austerity who consistently railed against what he perceived as an immoral society – collected and publicly torched objects Savonarola deemed to be associated with sin. Playing cards, mirrors, art, literature, dresses, musical instruments: nothing escaped their wrath.