1.
The Bonfire of the Vanities
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The Bonfire of the Vanities is a 1987 novel by Tom Wolfe. The novel was conceived as a serial in the style of Charles Dickens writings. Wolfe heavily revised it before it was published in book form, the novel was a bestseller and a phenomenal success, even in comparison with Wolfes other books. It has often called the quintessential novel of the 1980s. The title is a reference to the historical Bonfire of the Vanities, which happened in 1497 in Florence, Italy, Wolfe deliberately set out to make The Bonfire of the Vanities capture the essence of New York City in the 1980s. Wall Street in the 1980s was newly resurgent after most of the decade had been bad for stocks. Beneath Wall Streets success, the city was a hot-bed of racial and cultural tension, homelessness and crime in the city were growing. Roberts, a Bronx judge known for his no-nonsense imperious handling of cases in his courtroom, throughout his early career, Wolfe had planned to write a novel that would capture the wide spectrum of American society. Among his models was William Makepeace Thackerays Vanity Fair, which described the society of 19th century England, Wolfe remained occupied writing nonfiction books on his own and contributing to Harpers until 1981, when he ceased his other projects to work on the novel. Wolfe began researching the novel by observing cases at the Manhattan Criminal Court, to overcome a case of writers block, Wolfe wrote to Jann Wenner, editor of Rolling Stone, to propose an idea drawn from Charles Dickens and Thackeray. The Victorian writers whom Wolfe viewed as his models had often written their novels in serial installments, Wenner offered Wolfe around $200,000 to serialize his work. The deadline pressure gave him the motivation he had hoped for, Wolfe was not happy with his very public first draft, and thoroughly revised his work. Even Sherman McCoy, the character of the novel, changed—originally a writer. Wolfe researched and revised for two years, the Bonfire of the Vanities appeared in 1987. The book was a commercial and critical success, spending weeks on bestseller lists, the story centers on Sherman McCoy, a wealthy New York City bond trader with a wife and young daughter. Finding the ramp back to the highway blocked by trash cans, approached by two black men whom they perceive—uncertainly, in Shermans case—as predators, McCoy and Ruskin flee. Having taken the wheel of the car, which fishtails as they race away, Fallow cynically tolerates the manipulations of the Reverend Bacon, a Harlem religious and political leader who sees the hospitalized boy as a projects success story gone wrong. Fallows series of articles on the matter ignites a series of protests, up for re-election and accused of foot-dragging in the Lamb case, the media-obsessed Bronx District Attorney Abe Weiss pushes for McCoys arrest
2.
The Bonfire of the Vanities (film)
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The Bonfire of the Vanities is a 1990 American comedy-drama film adaptation of the best-selling novel of the same name by Tom Wolfe, originally serialized in Rolling Stone. The screenplay was written by Michael Cristofer, and the music score was composed by Dave Grusin. The film was marketed with the tagline An outrageous story of greed, lust, Sherman McCoy is a Wall Street bond trader who makes millions while enjoying the good life and the sexual favors of Maria Ruskin, a Southern belle gold digger. Sherman and Maria are driving back to Marias apartment from JFK Airport when they take a turn on the expressway. They are approached by two black youths after Sherman gets out of the car to move a tire placed purposely in the middle of the road. Sherman jumps back into the car and Maria guns the engine in reverse, running one of the teenagers. The two drive back to Marias apartment. Sherman initially wants to report incident to the police, but Maria immediately talks him out of it, as Sherman is brought to his knees, New York City fragments into different factions who use the case to suit their own cynical purposes. Finally, Sherman is left without any allies to him except for the sympathetic Judge Leonard White. She discovers information about the McCoy case, which she gives to Fallow, Sherman plays the tape in a tape recorder inside his briefcase connected to a small loudspeaker that he holds on the desk. When the judge orders that he approach the bench with this evidence, he asserts that the tape is all his, after the Judge made his point, he begs the people to be decent and change their ways, letting Sherman go. The film ends as it begins, where there is an audience applauding Peter Fallows premiere of his book. Fallow says that Sherman McCoy has moved away from New York City to an unknown destination, the film was plagued by controversy, the role of Peter Fallow was offered to both Jack Nicholson and John Cleese by Brian De Palma, but both turned down the role. When De Palma was unable to deliver an actor, the studio forced the director to cast Bruce Willis as Fallow instead, when the project was first pitched and Mike Nichols was the original director, he wanted Steve Martin for the role of Sherman McCoy. Tom Wolfe wanted Chevy Chase for McCoy as well, walter Matthau was initially offered the role of the judge, but demanded a fee of $1 million. The producers balked at meeting his price and signed Alan Arkin instead for a modest $150,000, edward James Olmos was also considered for the role of the judge. F. Murray Abraham, who had a significant part in the film, chose to not be credited, when he was denied the billing above the title that he had requested, he took his name off the picture. The studio made significant changes to the material, making Sherman McCoy more sympathetic and adding a subplot involving a minor character
3.
Perugia
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Perugia is the capital city of both the region of Umbria in central Italy, crossed by the river Tiber, and of the province of Perugia. The city is located about 164 kilometres north of Rome and 148 km south-east of Florence and it covers a high hilltop and part of the valleys around the area. The region of Umbria is bordered by Tuscany, Lazio, the history of Perugia goes back to the Etruscan period, Perugia was one of the main Etruscan cities. Perugia is also a cultural and artistic centre of Italy. The famous painter Pietro Vannucci, nicknamed Perugino, was a native of Città della Pieve and he decorated the local Sala del Cambio with a beautiful series of frescoes, eight of his pictures can also be admired in the National Gallery of Umbria. Perugino was the teacher of Raphael, the great Renaissance artist who produced five paintings in Perugia, another famous painter, Pinturicchio, lived in Perugia. Galeazzo Alessi is the most famous architect from Perugia, the citys symbol is the griffin, which can be seen in the form of plaques and statues on buildings around the city. Perugia was an Umbrian settlement but first appears in history as Perusia, one of the 12 confederate cities of Etruria. Fabius Pictors account, utilized by Livy, of the carried out against the Etruscan League by Fabius Maximus Rullianus in 310 or 309 BC. At that time a thirty-year indutiae was agreed upon, however, in 295 Perusia took part in the Third Samnite War and was reduced, with Volsinii and Arretium, a number of lead bullets used by slingers have been found in and around the city. Negotiations with the besieging forces fell to the bishop, Herculanus. Totila is said to have ordered the bishop to be flayed and beheaded, st. Herculanus later became the citys patron saint. In the Lombard period Perugia is spoken of as one of the cities of Tuscia. Peter, acknowledged the validity of the statement and recognised the established civic practices as having the force of law. However this dominant tendency was rather an anti-Germanic and Italian political strategy, midway through the 14th century Bartholus of Sassoferrato, who was a renowned jurist, asserted that Perugia was dependent upon neither imperial nor papal support. Civic peace was constantly disturbed in the 14th century by struggles between the party representing the people and the nobles. A citadel known as the Rocca Paolina, after the name of Pope Paul III, was built, in 1797, the city was conquered by French troops. On 4 February 1798, the Tiberina Republic was formed, with Perugia as capital, in 1799, the Tiberina Republic merged to the Roman Republic
4.
Agostino di Duccio
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Agostino di Duccio was an early Renaissance Italian sculptor. Born in Florence, he worked in Prato with Donatello and Michelozzo, in 1441, he was accused of stealing precious materials from a Florentine monastery and was banished from his native city as a result. The following year he continued the work on the altar of S. Geminiano for the Cathedral of Modena, the decorations were supposed to be a sort of mediaeval encyclopedia, with reliefs of zodiacal and other allegorical and mythological figures. In 1473 he designed the facade of the Porta di San Pietro in the city walls of Perugia. Other works are at Amelia and at the National Gallery of Umbria at Perugia and he died in about 1481 in Perugia
5.
Italian language
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By most measures, Italian, together with Sardinian, is the closest to Latin of the Romance languages. Italian is a language in Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City. Italian is spoken by minorities in places such as France, Montenegro, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Crimea and Tunisia and by large expatriate communities in the Americas. Many speakers are native bilinguals of both standardized Italian and other regional languages, Italian is the fourth most studied language in the world. Italian is a major European language, being one of the languages of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe. It is the third most widely spoken first language in the European Union with 65 million native speakers, including Italian speakers in non-EU European countries and on other continents, the total number of speakers is around 85 million. Italian is the working language of the Holy See, serving as the lingua franca in the Roman Catholic hierarchy as well as the official language of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta. Italian is known as the language of music because of its use in musical terminology and its influence is also widespread in the arts and in the luxury goods market. Italian has been reported as the fourth or fifth most frequently taught foreign language in the world, Italian was adopted by the state after the Unification of Italy, having previously been a literary language based on Tuscan as spoken mostly by the upper class of Florentine society. Its development was influenced by other Italian languages and to some minor extent. Its vowels are the second-closest to Latin after Sardinian, unlike most other Romance languages, Italian retains Latins contrast between short and long consonants. As in most Romance languages, stress is distinctive, however, Italian as a language used in Italy and some surrounding regions has a longer history. What would come to be thought of as Italian was first formalized in the early 14th century through the works of Tuscan writer Dante Alighieri, written in his native Florentine. Dante is still credited with standardizing the Italian language, and thus the dialect of Florence became the basis for what would become the language of Italy. Italian was also one of the recognised languages in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Italy has always had a dialect for each city, because the cities. Those dialects now have considerable variety, as Tuscan-derived Italian came to be used throughout Italy, features of local speech were naturally adopted, producing various versions of Regional Italian. Even in the case of Northern Italian languages, however, scholars are not to overstate the effects of outsiders on the natural indigenous developments of the languages
6.
Dominican Order
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Members of the order, who are referred to as Dominicans, generally carry the letters O. P. after their names, standing for Ordinis Praedicatorum, meaning of the Order of Preachers. Membership in the order includes friars, nuns, active sisters, the order is famed for its intellectual tradition, having produced many leading theologians and philosophers. The Dominican Order is headed by the Master of the Order, in the year 2000, there were 5,171 Dominican friars in solemn vows,917 student brothers, and 237 novices. By the year 2013 there were 6,058 Dominican friars, a number of other names have been used to refer to both the order and its members. In England and other countries the Dominican friars are referred to as Black Friars because of the black cappa or cloak they wear over their white habits, Dominicans were Blackfriars, as opposed to Whitefriars or Greyfriars. They are also distinct from the Augustinian Friars who wear a similar habit and their identification as Dominicans gave rise to the pun that they were the Domini canes, or Hounds of the Lord. The Dominican Order came into being in the Middle Ages at a time when religion began to be contemplated in a new way, men of God were no longer expected to stay behind the walls of a cloister. Instead, they travelled among the people, taking as their examples the apostles of the primitive Church. Out of this emerged two orders of mendicant friars, one, the Friars Minor, was led by Francis of Assisi, the other. Dominics new order was to be an order, trained to preach in the vernacular languages. Rather than earning their living on vast farms as the monasteries had done, at the same time, Dominic inspired the members of his order to develop a mixed spirituality. They were both active in preaching, and contemplative in study, prayer and meditation, the brethren of the Dominican Order were urban and learned, as well as contemplative and mystical in their spirituality. While these traits affected the women of the order, the nuns especially absorbed the latter characteristics, in England, the Dominican nuns blended these elements with the defining characteristics of English Dominican spirituality and created a spirituality and collective personality that set them apart. The orders origins in battling heterodoxy influenced its development and reputation. Many later Dominicans battled heresy as part of their apostolate, indeed, many years after St. Dominic reacted to the Cathars, the first Grand Inquistor of Spain, Tomás de Torquemada, would be drawn from the Dominican Order. As an adolescent, he had a love of theology. During his studies in Palencia, Spain, he experienced a famine, prompting Dominic to sell all of his beloved books. At the age of twenty-four or twenty-five, he was ordained to the priesthood, at that time the south of France was the stronghold of the Cathar or Albigensian heresy, named after the Duke of Albi, a Cathar sympathiser and opponent to the subsequent Albigensian Crusade
7.
Girolamo Savonarola
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Girolamo Savonarola was an Italian Dominican friar and preacher active in Renaissance Florence. He was known for his prophecies of civic glory, the destruction of art and culture. He denounced clerical corruption, despotic rule and the exploitation of the poor and he prophesied the coming of a biblical flood and a new Cyrus from the north who would reform the Church. In September 1494, when Charles VIII of France invaded Italy, while Savonarola intervened with the French king, the Florentines expelled the ruling Medici and, at the friars urging, established a popular republic. In 1495 when Florence refused to join Pope Alexander VIs Holy League against the French and he disobeyed and further defied the pope by preaching under a ban, highlighting his campaign for reform with processions, bonfires of the vanities, and pious theatricals. In retaliation, the Pope excommunicated him in May 1497, a trial by fire proposed by a rival Florentine preacher in April 1498 to test Savonarolas divine mandate turned into a fiasco, and popular opinion turned against him. Savonarola and two of his supporting friars were imprisoned, under torture, Savonarola confessed that he had invented his visions and prophecies. On 23 May 1498, Church and civil authorities condemned, hanged, Savonarola was born on 21 September 1452, in Ferrara. His grandfather, Michele Savonarola, was a physician and polymath. Savonarolas mother Elena claimed a lineage from the Bonacossi family of Mantua and she and her husband Niccolo had seven children, of whom Girolamo was third. His grandfather was a successful physician who oversaw his education. His family had amassed in his grandfathers footsteps, at some point, however, he abandoned his career intentions. In his early poems, he expresses his preoccupation with the state of the Church and of the world. He began to write poetry of a bent, notably On the Ruin of the World and On the Ruin of the Church. About the same time, he seems to have been thinking about a life in religion, as he later told his biographer, a sermon he heard by a preacher in Faenza persuaded him to abandon the world. True or not, in a letter he wrote to his father when he left home to join the Dominican Order he hints at being troubled by desires of the flesh. There is also a story that on the eve of his departure he dreamed that he was cleansed of such thoughts by a shower of icy water which prepared him for the ascetic life. In the unfinished treatise he left behind, later called De contemptu mundi, or On Contempt for the World, he calls upon readers to fly from this world of adultery, sodomy, murder and envy
8.
Florence
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Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the Metropolitan City of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with 383,083 inhabitants, Florence was a centre of medieval European trade and finance and one of the wealthiest cities of the time. It is considered the birthplace of the Renaissance, and has called the Athens of the Middle Ages. A turbulent political history includes periods of rule by the powerful Medici family, from 1865 to 1871 the city was the capital of the recently established Kingdom of Italy. The Historic Centre of Florence attracts 13 million tourists each year and it was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1982. The city is noted for its culture, Renaissance art and architecture, the city also contains numerous museums and art galleries, such as the Uffizi Gallery and the Palazzo Pitti, and still exerts an influence in the fields of art, culture and politics. Due to Florences artistic and architectural heritage, it has been ranked by Forbes as one of the most beautiful cities in the world, in 2008, the city had the 17th highest average income in Italy. Florence originated as a Roman city, and later, after a period as a flourishing trading and banking medieval commune. According to the Encyclopædia Britannica, it was politically, economically, and culturally one of the most important cities in Europe, the language spoken in the city during the 14th century was, and still is, accepted as the Italian language. Starting from the late Middle Ages, Florentine money—in the form of the gold florin—financed the development of all over Europe, from Britain to Bruges, to Lyon. Florentine bankers financed the English kings during the Hundred Years War and they similarly financed the papacy, including the construction of their provisional capital of Avignon and, after their return to Rome, the reconstruction and Renaissance embellishment of Rome. Florence was home to the Medici, one of European historys most important noble families, Lorenzo de Medici was considered a political and cultural mastermind of Italy in the late 15th century. Two members of the family were popes in the early 16th century, Leo X, catherine de Medici married king Henry II of France and, after his death in 1559, reigned as regent in France. Marie de Medici married Henry IV of France and gave birth to the future king Louis XIII, the Medici reigned as Grand Dukes of Tuscany, starting with Cosimo I de Medici in 1569 and ending with the death of Gian Gastone de Medici in 1737. The Etruscans initially formed in 200 BC the small settlement of Fiesole and it was built in the style of an army camp with the main streets, the cardo and the decumanus, intersecting at the present Piazza della Repubblica. Situated along the Via Cassia, the route between Rome and the north, and within the fertile valley of the Arno, the settlement quickly became an important commercial centre. Peace returned under Lombard rule in the 6th century, Florence was conquered by Charlemagne in 774 and became part of the Duchy of Tuscany, with Lucca as capital. The population began to again and commerce prospered
