Pier Paolo Pasolini was a controversial presence in Italian letters from the early 1950s until his assassination in November 1975. Deliberately provocative, his work invariably sparked debate and produced an extensive body of criticism. His novels are emblematic of the neorealist trend that dominated Italian letters and cinema during the 1940s and 1950s, and his film production continued to be at the forefront of cinematic experimentation in the decade that followed. His socially conscious essays underscored an incessant effort to undermine the status quo; they were published in the leading Italian dailies and periodicals during the final years of his life, and they stood in opposition to all contending political and social forces. His continuous search in his verse to understand the traumas afflicting contemporary Italian society earned him the appellation "civil poet." Pasolini is a rare example of an artist whose intense social and political engagement is channeled...