The essay offers an analysis of the La Mortaccia, an unfinished work thought as a rewriting of Dante’s Inferno. The main points examined concern the style and the language used, the construction of the suburban character (borgataro), the crisis of realism after the publication of Una vita violenta (1959), the influence of Dante’s interpretation by Auerbach, the study of the historical and political context marked by the publication of the article Marxisants and the relationship with The Divine Mimesis, which in 1975 takes up the project of rewriting Dante's Inferno. In conclusion, the article shows how La Mortaccia, as a literary failure, exhibits some of the main theoretical and poetic problems leading Pasolini to make his film debut in 1961 with Accattone.
