Pier Paolo Pasolini was born inBologna, Italy. He was the son of elementary school teacher Susanna Colussi, named after her great-grandmother,[7] and Carlo Alberto Pasolini, a lieutenant in theRoyal Italian Army, who had married in 1921. Pasolini was born in 1922 and named after a paternal uncle. His family moved toConegliano in 1923, then toBelluno in 1925, where their second son, Guidalberto, was born. In 1926, Pasolini's father was arrested for gambling debts. His mother moved with the children to her family's home inCasarsa della Delizia, in the Friuli-Venezia Giulia region. In that same year, his father first detained, then identifiedAnteo Zamboni as the would-be assassin ofBenito Mussolini following his assassination attempt.[citation needed] Carlo Alberto was persuaded of the virtues ofItalian fascism.[8]
Pasolini began writing poems at age seven, inspired by the natural beauty of Casarsa. One of his early influences was the work ofArthur Rimbaud. His father was transferred toIdria in theJulian March (now inSlovenia) in 1931;[9] in 1933 they moved again toCremona in Lombardy, and later toScandiano andReggio Emilia. Pasolini found it difficult to adapt to all these dislocations, although he enlarged his poetry and literature readings (Dostoyevsky,Tolstoy,Shakespeare,Coleridge,Novalis) and left behind the religious fervour of his early years. In the Reggio Emilia high school, he met his first true friend, Luciano Serra. The two met again in Bologna, where Pasolini spent seven years completing high school. Here he cultivated new passions, includingfootball. With other friends, including Ermes Parini, Franco Farolfi, Elio Meli, he formed a group dedicated to literary discussions.
In 1939, Pasolini graduated and entered the Literature College of theUniversity of Bologna, discovering new themes such asphilology andaesthetics offigurative arts. He also frequented the local cinema club. Pasolini always showed his friends a virile and strong exterior, totally hiding his interior turmoil. In his poems of this period, Pasolini started to include fragments inFriulan, a minority language he did not speak but learned after he had begun to write poetry in it. "I learnt it as a sort of mystic act of love, a kind offélibrisme, like theProvençal poets."[10] In 1943, he would found theAcademiuta della lenga furlana (Academy of the Friulan Language) with fellow students.[11] As a young adult, Pasolini identified as anatheist.[12]
In 1942, Pasolini published at his own expense a collection of poems in Friulan,Poesie a Casarsa, which he had written at the age of eighteen. The work was noted and appreciated by such intellectuals and critics asGianfranco Contini,Alfonso Gatto and Antonio Russi. Pasolini's pictures had also been well received. He was chief editor of a magazine calledIl Setaccio ('The Sieve'), but was fired after conflicts with the director, who was aligned with theFascist regime. A trip to Germany helped him also to perceive the "provincial" status ofItalian culture in that period. These experiences led Pasolini to revise his opinion about the cultural politics of Fascism and to switch gradually to acommunist position.
Pasolini's family took shelter in Casarsa, considered a more tranquil place to wait for the conclusion of theSecond World War, a decision common among Italian military families. Here he joined a group of other young enthusiasts of the Friulan language who wanted to giveCasarsa Friulan a status equal to that ofUdine, the official regional standard. From May 1944, they issued a magazine entitledStroligùt di cà da l'aga. In the meantime, Casarsa sufferedAllied bombardments and forced enlistments by theItalian Social Republic, as well aspartisan activity.
Pasolini tried to distance himself from these events. Starting in October 1943, Pasolini, his mother and other colleagues taught students unable to reach the schools inPordenone or Udine. This educational workshop was considered illegal and broke up in February 1944.[14] It was here that Pasolini had his first experience of homosexual attraction to one of his students.[citation needed] His brother Guido, aged 19, joined theParty of Action and theirBrigate Osoppo, taking to the bush near Slovenia. On 12 February 1945, Guido was killed in an ambush planted by theBrigate Garibaldi serving in the lines ofJosip Broz Tito'sYugoslavianguerrillas. This devastated Pasolini and his mother.[15]
Six days after his brother's death, Pasolini and others founded the Friulan Language Academy (Academiuta di lenga furlana). Meanwhile, on account of Guido's death, Pasolini's father returned to Italy from his detention period in November 1945, settling in Casarsa. That same month, Pasolini graduated from university after completing a final thesis about the work ofGiovanni Pascoli (1855–1912), an Italian poet andclassical scholar.[16]
In 1946, Pasolini published a small poetry collection,I Diarii ('The Diaries'), with the Academiuta. In October he traveled to Rome. The following May he began the so-calledQuaderni Rossi, handwritten in old schoolexercise books with red covers. He completed a drama in Italian,Il Cappellano. His poetry collection,I Pianti ('The cries'), was also published by the Academiuta.
In January 1950, Pasolini moved to Rome with his mother Susanna to start a new life. He was acquitted of two indecency charges in 1950 and 1952.[17] After one year sheltered in a maternal uncle's flat next toPiazza Mattei, Pasolini and his 59-year-old mother moved to a run-down suburb calledRebibbia, next to a prison, living there for three years. He transferred his Friulan countryside inspiration to this Roman suburb, one of the infamousborgate where poorproletarian immigrants lived, often in horrendous sanitary and social conditions. Instead of asking for help from other writers, Pasolini preferred to go his own way.
Pasolini found a job working in theCinecittà film studios and sold his books in thebancarelle ('sidewalk shops') of Rome. In 1951, with the help of theAbruzzese-language poet Vittorio Clemente, he found a job as a secondary school teacher inCiampino, just outside the capital. He had a long commute involving two train changes and earned a meagre salary of 27,000lire.
In 1954, Pasolini, who now worked for the literary section of Cinecittà, left his teaching job and moved to the Monteverde quarter. At this point, his cousin Graziella moved in. They also accommodated Pasolini's ailing,cirrhotic father Carlo Alberto, who died in 1958. Pasolini publishedLa meglio gioventù, his first important collection of Friulan poems. His first novel,Ragazzi di vita (English:Hustlers), which dealt with the Romanlumpenproletariat, was published in 1955. The work had great success but was poorly received by theItalian Communist Party (PCI) establishment and, most importantly, by the Italian government. It initiated a lawsuit for "obscenity" against Pasolini and his publisher,Garzanti.[18] Although exonerated, Pasolini became a target of insinuations, especially in thetabloid press.
In 1955, together withFrancesco Leonetti,Roberto Roversi and others, Pasolini edited and published a poetry magazine calledOfficina. The magazine closed in 1959 after fourteen issues. That year he also published his second novel,Una vita violenta, which unlike his first was embraced by the Communist cultural sphere: he subsequently wrote a column titledDialoghi con Passolini (meaningPassolini in Dialogue), for the PCI magazineVie Nuove from May 1960 to September 1965,[19] which were published in book form in 1977 asLe belle bandiere (The Beautiful Flags).[20] In the late 1960s Pasolini edited anadvice column in the weekly news magazineTempo.[21]
In 1966, Pasolini wrote a screenplay for a never-produced film about the apostleSaint Paul which he subsequently revised.[22] Pasolini's screenplay was intended to depict Paul as a modern contemporary without modifying any of Paul's statements.[23] In Pasolini's story, Paul is a fascistVichy France collaborator who becomes illuminated while traveling toFranco's Spain and joins theantifascistFrench resistance, an event which serves as the modern analogue for thePauline conversion.[24] The screenplay follows Paul as he preaches resistance in Italy, Spain, Germany, and New York (where he is betrayed, arrested, and executed).[25] As philosopherAlain Badiou writes, "The most surprising thing in all this is the way in which Paul's texts are transplanted unaltered, and with an almost unfathomable naturalness, into the situations in which Pasolini deploys them: war, fascism, American capitalism, the petty debates of Italian intelligentsia[.]"[26]
In 1970, Pasolini bought an old castle nearViterbo, several miles north of Rome, where he began to write his last novel,Il Petrolio, in which he denounced obscure dealing in the highest levels of government and the corporate world (Eni,CIA,the Mafia, etc.).[27] The novel-documentary was left incomplete at his death. In 1972, Pasolini started to collaborate with the far-left organizationLotta Continua, producing a documentary,12 dicembre, concerning thePiazza Fontana bombing. The following year he began a collaboration for Italy's most renowned newspaper,Il Corriere della Sera. At the beginning of 1975 Garzanti published a collection of his critical essays,Scritti corsari ('Corsair Writings').
In 1957, together withSergio Citti, Pasolini collaborated onFederico Fellini's filmNights of Cabiria, writing dialogue for theRoman dialect sections. Fellini also asked him to work on dialogue for some episodes ofLa dolce vita.[28] Pasolini made his debut as an actor inThe Hunchback of Rome in 1960, and co-wroteLong Night in 1943. Along withRagazzi di vita, he had his celebrated poemLe ceneri di Gramsci published, where Pasolini voiced tormented tensions between reason and heart, as well as the existing ideological dialectics within communism, a debate overartistic freedom,socialist realism and commitment.[29]
Pasolini's first film as director and screenwriter wasAccattone in 1961, again set among Rome's marginal communities, a story ofpimps,prostitutes, and thieves that contrasted with Italy's postwar economic recovery. Although Pasolini tried to distance himself fromneorealism, it is considered to be a type of second neorealism. Nick Barbaro, a critic writing in theAustin Chronicle, stated it "may be the grimmest movie" he has ever seen.[30] The film aroused controversy and scandal, with conservatives demanded stricter censorship by the government. In 1963, the episode "La ricotta", included in theanthology filmRo.Go.Pa.G., was censored, and Pasolini was tried for "offence to the Italian state and religion".[31]
The late 1960s and early 1970s was the era of thestudent movement. Pasolini, although acknowledging the students' ideological motivations, and referring to himself as a "CatholicMarxist",[34] thought them "anthropologicallymiddle-class" and therefore destined to fail in their attempts at revolutionary change. Regarding theBattle of Valle Giulia, which took place in Rome in March 1968, he said that he sympathized with the police, as they were "children of the poor", while the young militants were exponents of what he called "left-wing fascism".[citation needed] His film that year,Teorema, was shown at theVenice Film Festival in a hot political climate. Pasolini had proclaimed that the festival would be managed by the directors.[citation needed]
He wrote and directed the black-and-white filmThe Gospel According to Matthew (1964). It is based onscripture, but adapted by Pasolini, and he is credited as a writer. Jesus, a barefoot peasant, is played byEnrique Irazoqui. In his 1966 filmUccellacci e uccellini (literally "Bad Birds and Little Birds" but translated in English asThe Hawks and the Sparrows), apicaresque—and at the same time mystic—fable, Pasolini hired great Italian comedianTotò to work withNinetto Davoli, the director's lover at the time and one of his preferred "naif" actors. It was a unique opportunity for Totò to demonstrate that he was a great dramatic actor as well.[citation needed] InTeorema (Theorem, 1968), starringTerence Stamp as a mysterious stranger, Pasolini depicted the sexual coming-apart of abourgeois family. (Variations of this theme were later done byFrançois Ozon inSitcom,Joe Swanberg inThe Zone andTakashi Miike inVisitor Q.)[citation needed]
Later films centred on sex-laden folklore, such asBoccaccio'sDecameron (1971),Chaucer'sThe Canterbury Tales (1972), andIl fiore delle mille e una notte (literallyThe Flower of 1001 Nights, released in English asArabian Nights, 1974). These films are usually grouped as theTrilogy of Life. While basing them on classics, Pasolini wrote the screenplays and took sole writing credit. This trilogy, prompted largely by Pasolini's attempt to show the secular sacredness of the body against man-made social controls and especially against the venal hypocrisy of the religious state (indeed, the religious characters inThe Canterbury Tales are shown as pious but amorally grasping fools) were an effort at representing a state of natural sexual innocence essential to the true nature of free humanity. Alternately playfully bawdy and poetically sensuous, wildly populous, subtly symbolic and visually exquisite, the films were popular in Italy and remain perhaps his most enduringly popular works. Yet despite the fact that the trilogy as a whole is considered by many as a masterpiece, Pasolini later reviled his own creation on account of the many soft-core imitations of these three films in Italy that happened afterwards on account of the very same popularity he wound up deeply uncomfortable with. He believed that a bastardisation of his vision had taken place that amounted to a commoditisation of the body he had tried to deny in his trilogy in the first place. The disconsolation this provided is seen as one of the primary reasons for his final film,Salò, in which humans are not only seen as commodities under authoritarian control but are viewed merely as cyphers for its whims, without the free vitality of the figures in the Trilogy of Life.[citation needed]
His final work,Salò o le 120 giornate di Sodoma (Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom, 1975), exceeded what most viewers could accept at the time in its explicit scenes of sexual perversity and intenselysadistic violence. Based on the novel120 Days of Sodom byMarquis de Sade, it is considered Pasolini's most controversial film. In May 2006,Time Out's Film Guide named it the "Most Controversial Film" of all time. Salò was intended as the first film of hisTrilogy of Death, followed by an abortedbiopic film aboutGilles de Rais.
Note: All titles listed below were written and directed by Pasolini unless stated otherwise.
A small scandal broke out during a local festival inRamuscello in September 1949. Someone informed Cordovado, the local sergeant of theCarabinieri, of sexual conduct (masturbation) by Pasolini with three youngsters aged sixteen and younger after dancing and drinking.[40] Cordovado summoned the boys' parents, who refused to file charges despite Cordovado's urging. Cordovado nevertheless drew up a report, and the informer elaborated publicly on his accusations, sparking a public uproar. A judge inSan Vito al Tagliamento charged Pasolini with "corruption of minors andobscene acts in public places".[40][17] He and the 16-year-old were both indicted.[41]
The next month, when questioned, Pasolini would not deny the facts, but talked of a "literary and erotic drive" and citedAndré Gide, the 1947Nobel Prize for Literaturelaureate. Cordovado informed his superiors and the regional press stepped in.[41] According to Pasolini, theChristian Democrats instigated the entire affair to smear his name ("the Christian Democrats pulled the strings"). He was fired from his job in Valvasone[17] and was expelled from the PCI by the party's Udine section, which he considered a betrayal. He addressed a critical letter to the head of the section, his friend Ferdinando Mautino, and claimed he was being subject to a "tacticism" of the PCI. In the party, the expulsion was opposed by Teresa Degan, Pasolini's colleague in education. He also wrote her a letter admitting his regret for being "such a naif, even indecently so".[40] Pasolini's parents reacted angrily and the situation in the family also became untenable.[42] In late 1949, he decided to move to Rome along with his mother, seeking to start a new life, settling down in the outskirts of Rome.
In 1963, at the age of 41, Pasolini met "the great love of his life", 15-year-oldNinetto Davoli, whom he later cast in his 1966 filmUccellacci e uccellini (literally "Bad Birds and Little Birds" but translated in English asThe Hawks and the Sparrows). Pasolini became the youth's mentor and friend.[43]
Important women in Pasolini's life with whom he shared a feeling of profound and unique friendship were, in particular, actressLaura Betti and singerMaria Callas.Dacia Maraini, an Italian writer, said of Callas' behaviour towards Pasolini: "She used to follow him everywhere, even to Africa. She hoped to 'convert' him to heterosexuality and to marriage."[44] Pasolini was also sensible to the problematics related to the "new" role ascribed to women through the Italian media, stating in a 1972 interview that "women are not slot machines".[45]
He was a supporter of his hometown football clubBologna.[46]
By October 1945, the political status of theFriuli region became a matter of contention between different political factions. On 30 October, Pasolini joined the pro-devolution associationPatrie tal Friul, founded inUdine. Pasolini wanted a Friuli based on its tradition, attached to theCatholic Church in Italy, but intent on civic andsocial progress, as opposed to those advocates of regional autonomy who wanted to preserve their privileges based on "immobilism".[47] He also criticized theItalian Communist Party (PCI) for its opposition toregional devolution and preference instead forState centralisation. Pasolini founded the party Movimento Popolare Friulano, but resigned upon realizing that it was being covertly manipulated by Italy's rulingChristian Democratic Party to counter localTitoists, who were attempting to annex large swaths of the Friuli region to theSocialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.[47]
On 26 January 1947, Pasolini wrote a declaration that was published on the front page of the newspaperLibertà: "In our opinion, we think that currently only Communism is able to provide a new culture." It generated controversy, partly due to the fact he was still not a member of the PCI. Pasolini planned to extend the work of the Academiuta to the literature of otherRomance languages, and metexiledCatalan poet Carles Cardó. He took part in several demonstrations after joining the PCI. In May 1949, he attended the Peace Congress in Paris. Observing the struggles of workers and peasants, and watching the clashes of protesters with Italian police, he began to conceive his first novel. During this period, while holding a position as a teacher in a secondary school, he stood out in the local Italian Communist Party section as a skilful writer, while defying the official Party platform thatStalinism wasanti-Christian. Along with the Party leadership, local Christian Democrats and Catholic clergy also took notice. In the summer of 1949, Pasolini was warned by aRoman Catholic priest to renounceMarxism-Leninism or lose his teaching position. Similarly, after some posters were put up in Udine, Giambattista Caron, a Christian Democrat deputy, warned Pasolini's cousin Nico Naldini that "[Pasolini] should abandon communist propaganda" to prevent "pernicious reactions".[40]
Pasolini generated heated public discussion with controversial analyses of public affairs. For instance,autonomist university students were carrying on a guerrilla-style uprising against the police in the streets of Rome during thedisorders of 1968. For their supporters, the disorders were a civil fight of the proletariat against the system. Pasolini made comments that have been interpreted that he was with the police or that he was a man of order, and that he was an anti-anti-fascist.[48] According to the Centro Studi, Pier Paolo Pasolini, the myth of an "anti-anti-fascist" Pasolini served to propose unlikely anti-globalist alliances by neo-fascists.[48]Anti-antifascismo was never used by Pasolini and was only added in later years as the title of theScritti corsari collection.[48] Pasolini used the concept to attack various institutional subjects, such asChristian Democracy, the Italian presidentGiuseppe Saragat,RAI, and the Health Commission of the Chamber of Deputies, which were all guilty of ignoring some requests fromMarco Pannella, who had been onhunger strike for over two months.[48] He excluded the PCI from those parties of the constitutional arc that, as declared by Pasolini in June 1975, tried to "rebuild an anti-fascist virginity ... but, at the same time, maintaining the impunity of the fascist gangs that they, if they wanted, would liquidate in a day".[48]
The main source regarding Pasolini's views of the student movement is his poem "Il PCI ai giovani" ('The PCI to Young People'), written after theBattle of Valle Giulia. Addressing the students, he tells them that, unlike the international news media which has been reporting on them, he will not flatter them. He points out that they are the children of thebourgeoisie (Avete facce di figli di papà / Vi odio come odio i vostri papà – 'You have the faces of daddy's boys / I hate you like I hate your dads'), before statingQuando ieri a Valle Giulia avete fatto a botte coi poliziotti / io simpatizzavo coi poliziotti ('When you and the policemen were throwing punches yesterday at Valle Giulia / I was sympathising with the policemen'). He explained that this sympathy was because the policemen werefigli di poveri ('children of the poor'). The poem highlights the aspect of generational struggle within the bourgeoisie represented by the student movement:Stampa e Corriere della Sera, News- week e Monde / vi leccano il culo. Siete i loro figli / la loro speranza, il loro futuro... Se mai / si tratta di una lotta intestina ('Stampa andCorriere della Sera,Newsweek andLe Monde / they kiss your arse. You are their children / their hope, their future... If anything / it's in-fighting').[49]
The 1968 revolt was seen by Pasolini as an internal, benign reform of the establishment in Italy, since the protesters were part of the petite bourgeoisie.[50] The poem also implied a class hypocrisy on the part of the establishment towards the protesters, asking whether young workers would be treated similarly if they behaved in the same way:Occupate le università / ma dite che la stessa idea venga / a dei giovani operai / E allora: Corriere della Sera e Stampa, Newsweek e Monde / avranno tanta sollecitudine / nel cercar di comprendere i loro problemi? / La polizia si limiterà a prendere un po' di botte / dentro una fabbrica occupata? / Ma, soprattutto, come potrebbe concedersi / un giovane operaio di occupare una fabbrica / senza morire di fame dopo tre giorni? ('Occupy the universities / but say that the same idea comes / to young workers / So:Corriere della Sera andStampa,Newsweek andLe Monde / will have so much care / in trying to understand their problems? / Will the police just get a bit of a fight / inside an occupied factory? / But above all, how could / a young worker be allowed to occupy a factory / without dying of hunger after three days?')[49]
Pasolini suggested that the police were the true proletariat, sent to fight for a poor salary and for reasons which they could not understand, against pampered boys of their same age because they had not had the fortune of being able to study, referring topoliziotti figli di proletari meridionali picchiati da figli di papà in vena di bravate ('policemen, sons of proletarian southerners, beaten up by arrogant daddy's boys'). He found that the policemen were but the outer layer of the real power, e.g. the judiciary.[51] Pasolini was not alien to courts and trials. During all his life, Pasolini was frequently entangled in up to 33 lawsuits filed against him, variously charged with "public disgrace", "foul language", "obscenity", "pornography", "contempt of religion", and "contempt of the state", for which he was always eventually acquitted.[52][53]
The conventional interpretation of Pasolini's position has been challenged.[48] In an article published in 2015,Wu Ming argued that Pasolini's statements need to be understood in the context of Pasolini's self-confessed hatred of the bourgeoisie which had persecuted him for so long, as "Il PCI ai giovani" states that "We (i.e. Pasolini and the students) are obviously in agreement against the police institution", and that the poem portrays policemen as dehumanised by their work. Although the battles between students and the police were fights between the rich and the poor, Pasolini concedes that the students were "on the side of reason" whilst the police were "in the wrong". Wu Ming suggested that Pasolini intended to express scepticism regarding the idea of students being a revolutionary force, contending that only theworking class could make a revolution and that revolutionary students should join the PCI. Furthermore, he cites a column by Pasolini which was published in the magazineTempo later that year, which described the student movement, along with the wartime resistance, as "the Italian people's only two democratic-revolutionary experiences". That year, he also wrote in support of the PCI's proposals for disarming the police, arguing that this would create a break in the psychology of policemen. He said: "It would lead to the sudden collapse of that 'false idea of himself' ascribed to him by Power, which has programmed him like a robot." Pasolini's polemics were aimed at goading protesters into re-thinking their revolt, and did not stop him from contributing to the autonomistLotta Continua movement, who he described as "extremists, yes, maybe fanatic and insolently boorish from a cultural point of view, but they push their luck and that is precisely why I think they deserve to be supported. We must want too much to obtain a little."[54][55]
Pasolini was particularly concerned about the class of thesubproletariat, which he portrayed inAccattone, and to which he felt both humanly and artistically drawn. He observed that the type of purity which he perceived in the pre-industrial popular culture was rapidly vanishing, a process that he namedla scomparsa delle lucciole ('the disappearance of the fireflies'). Thejoie de vivre of boys was being rapidly replaced with more bourgeois ambitions such as a house and a family. He was critical of those leftists who held a "traditional and never admitted hatred against lumpenproletariats and poor populations". In 1958, he called on the PCI to become "'the party of the poor people': the party, we may say, of the lumpenproletarians".[20]
Pasolini's stance finds its roots in the belief that aCopernican change was taking place in Italian society and the world. Linked to that very idea, he was also an ardent critic ofconsumismo, i.e.consumerism, which he felt had rapidly destroyed Italian society from the mid-1960s to the early 1970s. He described thecoprophagia scenes inSalò as a comment on theprocessed food industry. As he saw it, the society of consumerism ("neocapitalism") and the "new fascism" had thus expanded an alienation / homogenization and centralization that the formerclerical fascism had not managed to achieve, so bringing about an anthropological change.[56] That change is related to the loss ofhumanism and the expansion of productivity as central to the human condition, which he despised. He found that 'new culture' was degrading and vulgar.[57] In one interview, he said: "I hate with particular vehemency the current power, the power of 1975, which is a power that manipulates bodies in a horrible way; a manipulation that has nothing to envy to that performed byHimmler orHitler." According to Pasolini scholar Simona Bondavalli, Pasolini's definition of neo-capitalism as a "new fascism" enforced uniform conformity without resorting to coercive means. As Pasolini put it, "No Fascist centralism succeeded in doing what the centralism of consumer culture did."[58] PhilosopherDavide Tarizzo summarized Pasolini's position:
"In his view, both old and new fascisms undermine the fundamentals of modern democracy. Yet new fascism does not do this by absolutizing popular sovereignty at the expense of individual rights. New fascism celebrates our freedoms and absolutizes human rights to the detriment of our sense of belonging to a social-political community. Therefore, old and new fascisms strive to accomplish democracy—which is the restless ambition of fascism—via opposite routes. In the former case, the result is the birth of political subjects such as the master race, supported by revelatory political grammar. In the latter case, the result is the birth of an altogether different subject, which is no longer a political actor, properly speaking, but a passive, anonymous entity: the human population."[59]
Pasolini saw some continuity between the Fascist era and the post-war political system which was led by the Christian Democrats, describing the latter as "clerico-fascism" due to its use of the state as a repressive instrument and its manipulation of power: he saw the conditions among the Roman subproletariat in theborgate as an example of this, being marginalised and segregated socially and geographically as they were under Fascism, and in conflict with a criminal police force.[55] He also blamed the Christian Democrats for assimilating the values of consumer capitalism, contributing to what he saw as the erosion of human values.[60]
The1975 Italian regional elections saw the rise of the leftist parties, and dwelling on his blunt, ever more political approach and prophetic style during this period, he declared inCorriere della Sera that the time had come to put the most prominent Christian Democrat figures on trial, where they would need to be shown walking in handcuffs and led by theCarabinieri; he felt that this was the only way they could be removed from power.[60][61] Pasolini charged the Christian Democratic leadership with being "riddled with Mafia influence", covering up a number ofbombings by neo-fascists,collaborating with the CIA, and working with the CIA and theItalian Armed Forces to prevent the rise of the left.[62][60]
Pasolini was angered byeconomic globalization and cultural domination of thenorth of Italy (aroundMilan) over other regions, especially thesouth.[citation needed] He felt this was accomplished through the power of television. A debate TV programme recorded in 1971, where he denounced censorship, was not actually aired until the day following his murder in November 1975. In a PCI reform plan that he drew up in September and October 1975, among the desirable measures to be implemented, he cited the abolition of television.[61]
Pasolini opposed the gradual disappearance ofItaly's minority languages by writing some of his poetry inFriulan, the regional language of his childhood. His opposition to the liberalization ofabortion law made him unpopular on the left.[63]
After 1968, Pasolini engaged with theleft-libertarian,anti-clerical, and liberalRadical Party (Partito Radicale). He involved himself inpolemics with party leaderMarco Pannella,[60][64] supported the Party's initiative calling for eightreferendums on various liberalising reforms,[65] and had accepted an invitation to speak at the Party's congress before he was killed.[20] Despite supporting the holding of areferendum on the decriminalisation of abortion, he was opposed to actually decriminalising it,[65] and he also criticised the Party's understanding of democratic activism as being a matter of equalising access to capitalist markets for the working class and othersubaltern groups.[66] In an interview he gave shortly before his death, Pasolini stated he frequently disagreed with the Party.[67] He continued to give qualified support to the PCI.[60] in June 1975, he said that he would still vote for the PCI because he felt it was "an island where critical consciousness is always desperately defended: and where human behaviour has been still able to preserve the old dignity", and in his final months he became close to the Rome section of theItalian Communist Youth Federation. A Federation activist, Vincenzo Cerami, delivered the speech he was due to give at the Radical Party congress: in it, Pasolini confirmed his Marxism and his support for the PCI.[20]
Outside of Italy, Pasolini took a particular interest in thedeveloping world, seeing parallels between life among the Italian underclass and in the third world, going so far as to declare thatBandung was the capital of three-quarters of the world and half of Italy. He was also positive about theNew Left in the United States, predicting that it would "lead to an original form of non-Marxist Socialism" and writing that the movement reminded him of theItalian Resistance. Pasolini saw these two areas of struggle as inter-linked: after visitingHarlem he stated that "the core of the struggle for the Third World revolution is really America".[20]
Pasolini was murdered on 2 November 1975 at a beach inOstia.[68] Almost unrecognizable, Pasolini was savagely beaten and also run over several times with his own car. Multiple bones were broken and histesticles were crushed by what appeared to have been a metal bar.[6][69] Anautopsy revealed that his body had been partially burned withgasoline after his death. The crime was long viewed as aMafia-stylerevenge killing, one that was extremely unlikely to have been carried out by only one person. Pasolini was buried at the cemetery ofCasarsa della Delizia.
Giuseppe "Pino" Pelosi (1958–2017), then 17 years old, was caught driving Pasolini's car and confessed to the murder. He was convicted and sentenced to 9 years in prison in 1976,[6] initially with "unknown others", but this phrase was later removed from the verdict.[62][70] Twenty-nine years later, on 7 May 2005, Pelosi retracted his confession, which he said had been made under the threat of violence to his family.[71] He claimed that three people "with asouthern accent" had committed the murder, while further insulting Pasolini as a "dirty communist."[72]
Other evidence uncovered in 2005 suggested that Pasolini had been murdered by anextortionist. Testimony by his friend Sergio Citti indicated that some of therolls of film fromSalò, or the 120 Days of Sodom had been stolen, and that Pasolini planned to meet with and negotiate its return from the thieves on 2 November 1975 following a visit toStockholm, Sweden.[73][74][75][76] Citti's investigation uncovered additional evidence, including a bloody wooden stick and an eyewitness who said he saw a group of men pull Pasolini from the car.[62][70] The Rome police reopened the murder as acold case after Pelosi's retraction, but theinvestigative magistrates responsible for the investigation found that the new elements were insufficient to justify a continued inquiry. As of 2023, a plea to reopen the case was filed based onDNA analysis and links the murder to theBanda della Magliana, acriminal organisation with close ties tofar-right terrorism, as the probable culprits.[6]
As a director, Pasolini created apicaresqueneorealism, showing a sad reality. Many people did not want to see such portrayals in artistic work for public distribution.Mamma Roma (1962), featuringAnna Magnani and telling the story of a prostitute and her son, was considered an affront to the public ideals and morality of those times. His works, with their unequalled poetry applied to cruel realities, showed that such realities were less distant from most daily lives, and contributed to changes in the Italian psyche.[77]
Pasolini's work often engendered disapproval, perhaps primarily because of his frequent focus on sexual behaviour, and the contrast between what he presented and what was publicly sanctioned. While Pasolini's poetry often dealt with his gay love interests, this was not the only, or even main, theme. His interest in and use of Italian dialects should also be noted. Much of the poetry was about his highly revered mother. He depicted certain corners of the contemporary reality as few other poets could do. His poetry, which took some time before it was translated, was not as well known outside Italy as were his films. A collection in English was published in 1996.[78]
Pasolini also developed a philosophy of language mainly related to his studies on cinema.[79] This theoretical and critical activity was another hotly debated topic. His collected articles and responses are still available today.[77][80][81]
These studies can be considered the foundation of his artistic point of view: he believed that the language—such as English, Italian, dialect or other—is arigid system in which human thought is trapped. He also thought that the cinema is the "written" language of reality which, like any other written language, enables man to see things from the point of view of truth.[79]
Many documentaries and films about Pasolini have been released since the time of his murder, some of which include:
Das Mitleid ist gestorben, a documentary directed by Ebbo Demant and released in 1978.
In 1986, the avant-garde bandCoil released their albumHorse Rotorvator, which includes the track "Ostia (The Death of Pasolini)" in tribute to the late filmmaker.
PPPasolini, directed by Malga Kubiak, a drama movie based on the story of Pier Paolo Pasolini's life and death, released in 2015. The movie was screened at the seventh edition of the LGBT Film Festival inWarsaw, and received a People's Choice Award at the festival.[84]
Since 2021,Tilda Swinton and Olivier Saillard have periodically organised a performance calledEmbodying Pasolini where Swinton dons or otherwise interacts with original pieces of costume from Pasolini's films.[86][87][88][89]
Poesie. San Vito al Tagliamento: Stamperia Primon, 1945.
Dov'e la mia patria (with thirteen drawings by Giuseppe Zigaina). Casarsa: Edizioni dell'Academiuta, 1949.
I pianti. Casrsa: pubblicazioni dell'Academiuta, 1946.
Tal cour d'un frut. Tricesimo: Edizioni di Lingua Friulana, 1953.
La meglio gioventu. Florence: Sansoni (Biblioteca diParagone), 1954.
Il canto populare. Milan: Garzanti, 1954
Dal diario (1945-47). Caltanissetta: Sciascia, 1954.
New edition, with an introductiuon by Leonardo Sciascia and illustrations by G. Mazzullo, 1979.
Le ceneri di Gramsci. Milan: Garzanti, 1957
new edition, with critical introduction by Walter Siti, Turin: Einaudi, 1981
L'usignolo della chiesa cattolica. Milan: Longanesi, 1958.
New edition, Turin: Einaudi, 1976.
Roma 1950: Diario. Milan: Scheiwiller, 1960.
La religione del mio tempo. Milan: Garzanti, 1961.
New edition, Turin: Einaudi, 1982.
Poesia in forma di rosa. Milan: Garzanti, 1964.
Poesie dimenticate. Edited by L. Ciceri. Udine: Societa filologica friulana, 1965.
Trasumanar e organizzar. Milan: Garzanti, 1971.
La nuova gioventu: Poesie friulane 1941-1974. Turin: Einaudi, 1975.
Le Poesie: Le ceneri di Gramsci. La religione del mio tempo, Poesia in forma di rosa, Trasumanar e organizzar. Milan: Garzanti, 1975.
Pier Paolo Pasolini: Selected Poems. Translated and edited by Norman MacAfee and Luciano Martinengo. Forward by Enzo Siciliano. Random House: New York, 1982.
Roman Poems. Translated and edited byLawrence Ferlinghetti and Francesca Valente. Introduction byAlberto Moravia. City Light Books: San Francisco, 1986.
Bestemmia: Tutte le poesie. Edited by Graziella Chiarcossi and Walter Siti, preface by Giovanni Giudici. Milan: Garzanti, 2 vols., 1993
Poesie scelte. Edited by Nico Naldini and Francesco Zambon. Milan: TEA, 1997.
Tutte le poesie. Edited by Walter Siti. Milan: Mondadori Meridiani, 2 vols., 2003.[90]
The Selected Poetry of Pier Paolo Pasolini. Translated and edited by Stephen Sartarelli. Introduction byJames Ivory. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2014.
Translated into English asSt. Paul: A Screenplay by Elizabeth A. Castelli. Preface byAlain Badiou. Introduction by Ward Blanton and Elizabeth A. Castelli. Edited by Elizabeth A. Castelli. London: Verso, 2025.
Passione e ideologia (1948–1958). Milan: Garzanti, 1960.
New edition with an introduction by Cesare Segre, Turin: Einaudi, 1985.
New edition with a preface by Alberto Asor Rosa, Milan: Garzanti, 1994.
Empirismo eretico. Milan: Garzanti, 1972.
Translated into English by Ben Lawton and Louise K. Barnett asHeretical Empiricism. Edited by Louise K. Barnett. Bloomington: Indiana University press, 1988.
L'Odore dell'India. Milan: Longanesi & C. S. p. A., 1974.
Translated into English by David Price asThe Scent of India. The Olive Press: London, 1984.
Scritti corsari. Milan: Garzanti, 1975.
(New edition with a preface by Alfonso Bernardinelli, 1990.)
Lettere luterane. Turin: Einaudi, 1976.
Translated into English byStuart Hood asLutheran Letters. Carcanet Press: New York, 1987.
Descrizioni di descrizioni. Edited by Graziella Chiarcossi. Turin: Einaudi, 1979. (New edition with a preface by G. Dossena, Milan: Garzanti, 1996.)
Il Portico della Morte. Edited by Cesare Segre. Milan: Garzanti, 1988.
I film degli altri. Edited by Tullio Kezich. Parma: Guanda, 1996.
Saggi sulla letteratura e sull’arte. Edited by Walter Siti and Silvia De Laude, 2 vols. Milan: Mondadori, 1999.
Saggi sulla politica e sulla società. Edited by Walter Siti and Silvia De Laude, 2 vols. Milan: Mondadori, 1999.
Pasolini: The Massacre Game. Translated by Anna Battista. Edited by Stephen Barber. The Sun Vision Press, 2013.
Heretical Aesthetics: Pasolini on Painting. Edited and translated with an introduction by Ara H. Merjian and Alessandro Giammei. Forward by T. J. Clark. London: Verso, 2023.
^Tarizzo, Davide (2021).Political grammars: the unconscious foundations of modern democracy. Square One: First Order Questions in the Humanities. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. p. 163.ISBN9781503615328.
^Héctor Rivera (28 March 2010)."Pasolini de nuevo".Sentido contrario (in Italian). Grupo Milenio. Archived fromthe original on 29 June 2012. Retrieved4 July 2012.
^Pasolini, Pier Paolo; Sartarelli, Stephen (2014).The Selected Poetry of Pier Paolo Pasolini. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. p. 283.ISBN978-0-226-64844-6.
Aichele, George. "Translation as De-canonization: Matthew's Gospel According to Pasolini – filmmaker Pier Paolo Pasolini – Critical Essay".Cross Currents (2002).
Chiesa, Lorenzo.Pasolini and the Ugliness of Bodies. In: Polezzi, Loredana and Ross, Charlotte, eds. In Corpore: Bodies in Post-Unification Italy. Farleigh Dickinson University Press, Madison, pp. 208–227.ISBN978-0-8386-4164-4.
Eloit, Audrene. "Oedipus Rex by Pier Paolo Pasolini The Palimpsest: Rewriting and the Creation of Pasolini's Cinematic Language".Literature Film Quarterly (2004).
Fabbro, Elena (ed.).Il mito greco nell'opera di Pasolini. Atti del Convegno Udine-Casarsa della Delizia, 24–26 ottobre 2002. Udine: Forum (2004).ISBN88-8420-230-2.
Forni, Kathleen. "A "Cinema of Poetry": What Pasolini Did to Chancer's Canterbury Tales".Literature Film Quarterly (2002).
Frisch, Anette. "Francesco Vezzolini: Pasolini Reloaded". Interview, Rutgers University Alexander Library, New Brunswick, NJ.
Ginzburg, Carlo, Safran, Yehuda, Sherer Daniel. "An Interview with Carlo Ginzburg, by Yehuda Safran and Daniel Sherer". Potlatch 5 (2022), special issue on Carlo Ginzburg. Discussion of Ginzburg's meeting with Pasolini and Elsa Morante and Pasolini's interest in Ginzburg's work as a historian of Friuli.
Green, Martin. "The Dialectic Adaptation".
Greene, Naomi.Pier Paolo Pasolini: Cinema as Heresy. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 1990.
Hamza, Agon.Althusser and Pasolini - Philosophy, Marxism and Film. Palgrave, NY (2016).ISBN978-1-137-56651-5.
Meyer-Krahmer, Benjamin. "Transmediality and Pastiche as Techniques in Pasolini's Art Production", in: P.P.P. – Pier Paolo Pasolini and death, eds. Bernhart Schwenk, Michael Semff, Ostfildern 2005, pp. 109–118.
Passannanti, Erminia,Il corpo & il potere. Salò o le 120 giornate di Sodoma di Pier Paolo Pasolini, Prima edizione, Troubador, Leicester, 2004; Seconda Edizione, Joker, Savona 2008.
Passannanti, Erminia,Il Cristo del'Eresia. Pier Paolo Pasolini. Cinema e Censura, Joker, Savona 2009.
Passannanti, Erminia,La ricotta. Il Sacro trasgredito. Il cinema di Pier Paolo Pasolini e la censura religiosa, 2009 was also published in "Italy on Screen" (Peter Lang Ed., 2011). The book contains excerpts from the 1962 court trial.
Pugh, Tison. "Chaucerian Fabliaux, Cinematic Fabliau: Pier Paolo Pasolini's I racconti di Canterbury",Literature Film Quarterly (2004).
Restivo, Angelo.The Cinema of Economic Miracles: Visuality and Modernization in the Italian Art Film. London: Duke UP, 2002.
Rohdie, Sam.The Passion of Pier Paolo Pasolini. Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana UP, 1995.
Rumble, Patrick A.Allegories of contamination: Pier Paolo Pasolini's Trilogy of life. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1996.
Siciliano, Enzo.Pasolini: A Biography. Trans. John Shepley. New York: Random House, 1982.
Thompson, N.S.,Pier Paolo Pasolini: Poet and Prophet, in Murray, Glen (ed.),Cencrastus No. 7, Winter 1981 - 82, pp. 30 – 32.
Tusa, Giovanbattista. "The Pasolinian Century", in: Hildebrandt, Toni and Tusa, Giovanbattista (eds.),PPPP. Pier Paolo Pasolini Philosopher. Mimesis International, 2022, pp. 317–323.
Viano, Maurizio.A Certain Realism: Making Use of Pasolini's Film Theory and Practice. Berkeley:University of California Press, 1993.
Willimon, William H. "Faithful to the script",Christian Century (2004).
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