Takes up a series of literary and physical pleasures that do not appear to be pleasurable, ranging from Christian saintly asceticism to Sadean narrative to contemporary s/m practices.

Counterpleasures takes up a series of literary and physical pleasures that do not appear to be pleasurable, ranging from saintly asceticism to Sadean narrative to leathersex. Each is placed in its cultural context to unfold a history of transgressive pleasure and to argue for the value and power of such pleasures as resistant to more totalizing forms of power.