The author outlines, within the psychoanalytic tradition, some great currents of thought on the subject of perversions and in particular of sadomasochism. From this investigation, it is immediately unavoidable a deepening of the nature of sexuality and of the context in which the pleasure of orgasm is realized. De Masi then considers the relationship between shared sexuality and the perverse experience, and those between perversion and deviance, as well as the current social image of perversion as a phenomenon no longer relegated to anonymity and secrecy. In the universe of perversions, sadomasochism, however, remains mysterious and, even for reasons of confidentiality, is not too widely treated in psychoanalytic literature. De Masi's investigation leads him to emphasize its dangerous and extreme aspect, which coincides with the sexualisation of destructive pleasure. However, the author does not neglect the possibility that perverse behavior or sadomasochistic fantasies acted are often symptomatic of the reactualization of other experiences, and that in such behaviors the pleasure is connected to the traumatic regret of painful experiences of the past.