INTRODUCTION

Popular culture has been gradually emerging from the mainstream culture, occupying its  own cultural ground and becoming an integral part of everyday life. In the middle of the 18th century, with the industrial revolution, the development of technology and media accelerated the development of popular culture, making it accessible to wider social strata, shaping the everyday life of a modern man.

The question this paper addreses is the conceptualization of popular culture, consideration of the specifics of the culture of body and pleasure as one of the elements of popular culture, and comparison of the exposed characteristics with the thinking and acting of Harold Pinter’s drama characters. The presentation of the consumption of popular pleasures and behavior of Pinter’s protagonists in the culture of the body indicates the strong influence of popular culture and its embodiment in the consciousness of a modern man.

The aim of the paper is to identify the basic features of understanding the body and pleasures in popular culture in relation to the ruling ideology, as well as the analysis of the actions of the protagonists of Pinter’s plays, as representatives of the modern society. The pleasures consumed by Harold Pinter’s drama characters are classified as: jouissance/the pleasures of avoiding or resisting the ruling ideology; plaisir/the pleasures of creating meaning that involves adapting to or opposing the ruling ideology; and the hegemonic pleasures of conformism. In this paper, the analysis includes inductive, deductive and comparative methods, as well as theoretical assumptions of renowned scientists such as John Storey, John Fiske, Roland Barthes and Mikhail Bakhtin.

The hypothesis of the paper is that Pinter’s protagonists develop their own views on the pleasures they consume, which are mostly created in relation to the ruling ideology. In an attempt to make their own lives meaningful and realize individual potentials, Pinter’s protagonists choose the pleasures they cling to, with their thinking and acting largely determined by popular culture of which they are an integral part. Although the actions of  Pinter’s protagonists are aimed at achieving their own goals, their articulation is marked by popular thinking in the form of evasiveness, resistance, adaptation or opposition to the ideology of the power bloc.

Given that the participation of the protagonists of the plays Dumb Waiter, Birthday Party, Caretaker, Homecoming, No Man’s Land, and Betrayal, in popular and hegemonic pleasures has not been studied in detail in our region, this topic contributes to deeper understanding of popular  motives which drive a modern man embodied in Harold Pinter’s drama characters.

DEFINING POPULAR CULTURE

The industrial revolution took place in the middle of the 18th century, increasing production, improving living conditions and leading to new consumers’ needs and development of popular culture. The development of society, science and technology continued and accelerated in the nineteenth century, which, due to numerous events that began with the French Revolution and ended with the October Revolution, as well as the beginning of the socialist era, historians call the “long nineteenth century”. The beginning of the century was marked by the rise of France, and its end – by the huge British empire over which “the sun never sets”. Cities were being developed rapidly and grew into megalopolises where more and more people were rushing to prosper. The twentieth century brought new challenges in which popular culture spread popular content and established its place in people’s daily lives in the form of commercial labels, brands, clothing, food, lyrics, music, movies, language and overall lifestyle. Along with popular culture, 
under the general splendor, attractive advertisements and enticing texts, a special ideology was being developed, invisible to the eye, the ideology of the ruling forces, aspiring for domination. The capitalistic society based on the exploitation of the working class was developing various strategies to preserve its power. Popular culture, as John Fiske points out, became a battlefield between those above and 
those below, between the superiors and the subordinates, between the strong and the weak, between the power blocs and the oppresed ones. Subordinate groups have been developing a strategy of resistance, withdrawal, avoidance or adaptation to dominant culture.

Popular culture, in the sense in which it is explained by Fiske, appears as a reaction of members of subordinate groups to the ideology of the ruling powers. Members of subordinate groups create popular culture by creating their own meanings of material-functional and semiotic-cultural goods offered to them. They find different pleasures in consuming and interpreting given cultural materials and thus creating their own cultural space different from the one offered by the forces of domination.

“Popular texts must offer popular meanings and pleasures – popular meanings are constructed from the relationship between the text and everyday life, and popular pleasures arise from the production of these meanings among people, from the power to produce them.” (Fisk, 2001: 147)1 

John Storey indicates that there are various ways to contextualize popular culture and provides four meanings of the term popular: 

“Williams (1983) suggests four current meanings: ‘well liked by many people’; ‘Inferior kinds of work’; ‘Work deliberately setting out to win favor with the people’; ‘Culture actually made by the people for themselves’ (237).” (Storey, 2001: 5) 

Further, Storey suggests that if one wants to understand what popular culture is, he has to take into consideration all the respective meanings of the term popular, and the term culture.

Popular culture in relation to pleasures

Capitalistic, hegemonic civilization is in line with the aspirations of the forces of domination to gain even more wealth and power, and the aspirations of the subordinates to work for better living conditions, as well as to pursue pleasures and fulfil personal interests in order to achieve happiness. A member of the lower strata of society faces poverty as a result of unequal distribution of wealth, and insecurity, grouch and stress in the lack of money fill his daily life. The poorer the subordinate groups are, the richer the ruling minority is. The consuming society seeks happiness in abundance and shopping and the individual has access to more and more popular pleasures which he explores in his free time in order to forget the anguish of everyday life.  

Fiske in Popularna kultura (Popular Culture) (Fiske, 2001: 60-80) points out that there are many pleasures that can have contradictory forms, and cites antitheses: aesthetic pleasures (sublime versus entertainment), political pleasures (reactionary versus revolutionary), discursive (creation of meaning versus acceptance of ready-made meanings), physiological pleasures (spiritual pleasures versus body 
pleasures), disciplinary (pleasures of manifesting force versus pleasures of avoiding force). Fisk also emphasizes that in the respective study he deals primarily with the relationship of popular pleasures against hegemonic ones, where popular pleasures are created by members of a subordinate stratum of society and represent opposition (social, moral, textual) in relation to the ruling forces that try to tame, shape and discipline them. Fiske also distinguishes between pleasures related to power, which are widespread in all strata of society in the form of exercising power over other people, especially over women and children, or in the form of exercising power over oneself through self-discipline. The pleasures of conformism are hegemonic pleasures. Fiske explains that the action of popular pleasures takes two forms: avoidance (aggression) and productivity, and that both contain resistance that manifests itself differently in each form. Furthermore, the evasive element is focused on the body and while some find positive values   in the 
pleasures of the body, others consider it a source of fake pleasures. The above  mentioned conflict over the meaning of the body reflects the struggle for power in which classes, gender and race participate. 

Fiske presents Barthes (1975) notion of jouissance and plaisir, where jouissance is blissful, ecstatic, evasive, aggressive, youthful, bodily pleasure that occurs when one loses oneself. It is subjective and carries with it the meaning of avoidance: 

“Orgasmic pleasure of the body that is beyond control – the loss of being – is the pleasure of avoiding, escaping from self-control/social control which, according to Foucault’s effective statement, “people manage themselves and others”. It is an escape from meaning, since meaning is always a product of society and as such reproduces social forces in the subject.” (Fisk, 2001: 62) 

Fiske states that jouissance encompasses the pleasures of escape, such as loud rock and roll music, lively dancing, blinding lights in a disco, and carries the meaning of avoiding the impositions of the ruling ideology.

Fiske points out that Bahtin2 (1968) developed theories of carnival inversions and avoidances that were reflected through bodily liberation, sexuality, enjoyment of food and drink, with Bakhtin emphasizing the liberation of the social organism. It is stated that physical pleasures are public, and that  jouissance takes place in the study while carnival takes place on the streets. It is also emphasized that the resistance expressed by bodily, vulgar, aggressive energy presents rejection of social control, ie the resistance that maintains a social identity which is different from the one supported by social discipline and which is opposed to it. The enjoyment of jouissance creates a certain cultural territory of the subordinates, which by its existence signifies resistance to the ruling forces.

Unlike jouissance, which is personal and physical, evasive and aggressive, Barthes explains plaisir as a product of society that signifies social identity, its recognition and confirmation, and that its roots lie in the ruling ideology. Plaisir represents the pleasures created by people, and can involve the pleasures of adapting or opposing the ruling ideology, depending on whether the ruling ideology is in line with ones 
interests or not. The form of the experienced plaisir ranges from reactionary to subversive.

Fiske emphasizes that there are two types of pleasures: the pleasures of avoidance related to the body and the pleasures of creating meaning related to social identity and social relations,  providing semiotic resistance to the ruling forces. It is emphasized that popular culture is an integral part of everyday life operating on a micro-political level, and that it is progressive. Popular culture is a part of everyday 
unequal power relations in social structures and its progressiveness is reflected in its attempts to strengthen and expand the subordinates and the weak and improve their living space.

Fiske also explains the pleasure of discomfort which arises in the conflict between the conventional and the subversive, and contains within itself both, the values of the ruling forces and those of the subordinate, and occurs “when what is ideologically repressed conflicts with the forces that suppress it” (Fisk, 2001: 78)3, as well as the pleasure of a routine of popular culture such as watching television. Fiske points out that satisfaction and importance are not always related to gaining power, but that they strive for it, and that strengthening the self-awareness of the subordinates is a precondition for the development of resistance. Considering the pleasures of avoidance, evasion of social control, and self-discipline, Fiske analyses aggressive bodies and carnival pleasures in which the body carries the meaning of a struggle in which hegemonic forces seek to achieve power and domination through discipline and control.

1  Original text: „Popularni tekstovi moraju da nude popularna značenja i zadovoljstva – popularna značenja konstruisana su iz odnosa između teksta i svakodnevnog života, a popularna zadovoljstva proističu iz proizvodnje tih značenja među ljudima, iz moći da se ona proizvode.” Translation used in the paper has been done by the author.

2  Mikhail Bakhtin (1895- 1975), Russian philosopher, literary critic and scholar.

3   Original text: „kada se ono što je ideološki potisnuto sukobi sa snagama koje ga potiskuju.” Translation used in the paper has been done by the author.

PINTER’S DRAMA CHARACTERS IN THE CULTURE OF BODY AND PLEASURE

In the drama Dumb Waiter, Gus and Ben enjoy the pleasure of adapting to the ruling ideology, supporting its existance with their deeds. They carry out the given commands, maintaining the existing social order and thus finding their own confirmation in society. At the same time, the control over Gus and Ben as a class body is expressed in the form of determining their free time by productive, but paternalistic means of controlling the pleasures of subordinate classes. As Fiske explains, the bourgeoisie used all possible means to exercise control over leisure conditions, the same as that which it exercised over working conditions, and to determine meanings and behavior in connection with holidays, culture, and sports. Ben, in addition to 24  hours working days, has some control over his free time and interests which helps him work better and earn more for his superiors, while Gus, on the other hand, has no interests and is blamed for waisting his leisure time, being a threat to the social order: 

“Ben: You know what your trouble is?
 Gus: What?
 Ben: You haven’t got any interests.
 Gus: I’ve got interests.
 Ben: What? Tell me one of your interests.
 Pause.
 Gus: I’ve got interests.

 Ben: Look at me. What have I got?
 Gus: I don’t know. What?
 Ben: I’ve got my woodwork. I’ve got my model boats. Have you ever seen me
 idle? I’m never idle. I know how to occupy my time, to its best advantage.
 Then when a call comes, I’m ready.” (Pinter, 1996: 118)

The forces of domination control society not only by strictly disciplining measures, but also by lowering the awareness of the subordinates about what is right and what is wrong, and by creating the belief that the system is not responsible for poverty but the subordinates themselves, which, as Fiske points out, is an example of the ideological strategy – blaming the victim. Gus and Ben, the soldiers of the forces of domination, who enforce social discipline, as the most important factor in supporting the ruling ideology, are themselves subjected to it. In addition to mechanized labor and leisure, the bourgeoisie also tries to colonize the field of sports. Certain sports have certain functions, as Fiske explains. Football and boxing, with their folk roots, present not only recreation, but  also liberation from all disciplines and norms of behavior, which can lead to creating disorder, posing a threat to the existing social system. Therefore, the middle class tries to impose its ethos, norms of behavior and actions on sports, so that it could influence the character formation of young people in an organized and controlled way, and form the obedient nation. Football was transferred from the streets where it was first played by the subordinate class, and where it posed a potential threat to the ruling class, to regulated fields, where the rules set by the ruling ideology are respected, thus enabling control and domination. Gus and Ben reveal that they are great football fans and true representatives of the followers of the mentioned ideology:

“Gus: Eh, it’s Friday today, isn’t it? It’ll be Saturday tomorrow.
 Ben: What about it?
 Gus:(excited). We could go and watch the Villa.
 Ben: They’re playing away.
 Gus: No, are they? Caarr! What a pity.
 Ben: Anyway, there’s no time. We’ve got to get straight back.
 Gus: Well, we have done in the past, haven’t we? Stayed over and watched a
 game, haven’t we? For a bit of relaxation.
 Ben: Things have tightened up, mate. They’ve tightened up.” (Pinter, 1996 : 121)

Gus and Ben express plaisir in owning, cleaning and constantly checking weapons, which plaisir social norms determine as a symbol of masculinity and strength, while their aggression is a reflection of  jouissance liberating pleasure.

In the drama Birthday Party, Goldberg and McCann, like Gus and Ben, express their plaisir in adapting to the imposed social norms and represent an extended arm of the ruling ideology which cannot be avoided. Their satisfaction is hegemonic, stemming from a dominant ideology that strives to be maintained through control. Godlberg addresses Stanley in a long interrogation, aiming to confuse, disorient and lobotomize him: “But we have a solution for you. We can sterilize you.” (Pinter, 1982: 62)4 However, on the other hand, the vulgarities uttered by Goldberg and McCann, such as – garbage, plague, bastards, and indulgence in the aggression they direct at Stanley – “Wake him up. Stick a needle in his eye.” (Pinter, 1982: 62)5, belong to jouissance  of getting youself lost in action and exaggeration. However, they do not pose a threat to the social order because the mentioned protagonists are its servants. Petey also belongs to plaisir of adjustment, but he does not implement the disciplinary measures of the ruling ideology. He obediently accepts the society as it is offered to him and shows and follows the paths that the order outlines for him. He leads a life filled with routine and fits into expected behavior.

Evasive behavior, a kind of escape from the social system, avoidance of social control and norms prescribed by the holders of social control as acceptable, can be seen in Stanley, who  retreats into isolation of the seaside boarding house. The ruling ideology interprets his refusal to be part of the society as a threat and subversion, and immediately takes steps to suppress and control such behavior. Stanley also 
shows the satisfaction of inverting social discipline in his flirtation with Meg, a married woman. Patriarchal norms of behavior mean that a married woman should be focused to her family and household, but Stanley finds pleasure in a semi-loving relationship with Meg, treating her with love, contempt and aggression, but also as his mother, resisting everything society expects from him. On the other hand, Meg shows plaisir of opposing, creating a different meanings in relation to the existing ones, and directs her spiritual and physical interest to Stanley. She connects her sexual energy with the guest of her boarding house and thus endangers the credibility of social discipline. If social discipline has no foundation in  people, then both social order and entire dominant system are considered weak. At a birthday party, the inverted world of popular pleasures comes to the fore. First of all, it is questionable whether it is Stanley’s birthday or not, and then vulgarity, physicality, aggression and repression develop to the level of culmination.

The evasive popular pleasure of avoiding and retreating is reflected in the character of Aston in the drama Caretaker. Unlike Stanley, who is retreating in order to avoid the forces of social discipline, so that they would not absorb and lobotomize him, Aston has already gone through the process of lobotomy. The forces of the ruling ideology have already done their disciplinary measures and applied them to  Aston, thus transforming him into an individual who has lost his own being. He loses the ability to think and act in accordance with his ideas, that is, to manage his own life. Aston’s personality is present only in traces. His thought are slow as well as his deeds, but still, he shows signs of empathy towards another being. Faced with his micro world, isolated from social life, Aston seeks the meaning and satisfaction in what society has made available to him - small purchases and small repairs: “Aston: I’ll stroll along the streets a bit. A little ... a little shopping. The man left one drill there these days. I would like to see that, in every way.” (Pinter, 1982: 109)6.

Davies’ evasiveness, deviance from the social system and escape into the labyrinth of his imaginary life strategy are different from Aston’s. Confused and dissatisfied, in the system that offers only certain patterns of behavior and living, trapped in a lower class body that is not allowed to progress and improve because it is subordinate and intended for hard work, order and discipline in the name of acquiring the goods 
for a higher class body, Davies is lost in his search for the meaning and experiences alternately both plaisir and jouissance. He seeks plaisire in trying to adapt to the situations that are imposed on him. He tries to find a job and live his life as required by the rules. Therefore, he accepts the offers of both Aston and Mick, but does not manage neither of them because the desire to fit arises from fatigue from his wandering through the winding paths of modern life, and does not arise as his own, thoughtful idea of   self-realization and the development of his competencies. Out of a desire to adapt, Davies turns to twisting moral norms, inconsistency and betrayal. Davies also inverts the social discipline by enjoying jouissance of rejecting orders and subordinate positions imposed on him by society, and explains to Aston why he lost his job: “Who is that idiot to command me? There is no difference between us. He’s not my boss. He is nothing more than I am.” (Pinter, 1982: 97)7 By not accepting orders and refusing obedience to the class body to which he belongs, Davis poses a threat to the ideology of the forces of domination. Pinter only hints in parts of Davies’ biography, which is as contradictory as Davies himself. Despite being poor and thus disenfranchised, he shows protest against the social classification based on the mentioned parameters: “Davies: Let me be a tramp, but I have the same rights as other people.” (Pinter, 1982: 98)8 In his evasive retreat, he is not determined whether he will be a part of the society or not, nor can he decide, because his consciousness is still limited by the impositions of the society and Davies is not able to rise above 
that. While he claims that he cannot walk because he does not have shoes, that is, to act without material means, Davies refuses to enter other people’s shoes because  they do not suit him, just as he feels that the offered subordinate positions do not suit his aspirations.

The prevalence of the idea of   the importance of jouissance popular carnival pleasures of sports competition is reflected in Davies’ presentation of his own fantasies about the future in which he dreams of being a part of that sports world. However, Davies, despite being revolutionary in certain situations, is already partially socially lobotomized and he is not able to finish his thought, so it remains vague. He doesn’t see himself as part of the competitors, the main players, but as the support staff:

“You know, I thought, one day, when I move there, I can see how things are at Wembley. Because those matches, you understand? They need people to run on the field, you know, to be careful. Or something else, something else I could, I could go down to Kennington. Because all those big sports fields, so it’s like one and one, people are needed, to guard the playground, they need it, without that they just can’t. Close to common sense, isn’t it? (Pause) Just to go there once.” (Pinter, 1982: 112)9

Unlike Aston and Davies, Mick enjoys plaisir of adapting, developing his consumer character shaped by material consumer ideology. He finds meaning in small business, which brings him certain income and real estate ownership. Occasionally, Mick experiences jouissance popular pleasure of expressing aggression towards Davies, thus expressing dissatisfaction with the incompleteness of his position, but 
that feeling does not persist and he returns to the routine of his everyday material life.

Plaisir of adapting, is also felt by Teddy in the play Homecoming, but in a different, more intellectual way than Mick. With his routine, slow, lethargic, but safe way of life, he also contributes to the establishment of modern life flows. Like Mick, Lenny’s tendency to adapt to modern social trends is influenced by the consumer aspirations of hyper-consumerism. Externally polished, Lenny is still different from Mick because he inverts social discipline and expectations in the form of belonging to the underground world of crime and prostitution. His pleasures are bodily, vulgar and exaggeration is obvious. The world in which he moves is brutal, aggressive and reflects jouissance resistance to the established values   by denying them. The sexual energy he develops in relation to Ruth, his brother’s wife, is contrary to all patriarchal moral norms and is based on the struggle for domination. Lenny’s physical brutality is especially evident in a conversation with Ruth when he explains his feelings 
towards the prostitute who was his employee and who offered him his services: 

 “...Well, there was nothing so unusual in her proposal and I usually agree. I mean, I would have agreed even if the conditions had been normal. Only, the trouble was that she was falling apart from syphilis. I had to turn her down. But the lady kept pushing me under the arch. No one can expect me to agree to her insistence, under the given circumstances. And – when you consider it – it is clear that I had to shake it. It went through my head then to get rid of her. You understand me – to silence her. The fact is that this – I mean murder –would be a very simple thing...” (Pinter, 1982: 171)10

In Lenny’s perverted world, there are no moral brakes, compassion, empathy, justice, or frameworks of interpersonal relationships. There is no good or evil, but only willingness to survive. He indulges in instincts and the law of the stronger, while weakened individuals are to be removed.

The bodily principle of fighting and competing is embodied in the character of Joey, the youngest brother, who trains boxing. Sport carries a set of meanings related to the strength, power, activity and physical side of being. It carries the meanings of naturalness and sexuality, and enables the confirmation of physical ability. As Fiske point out, control over the body is control over society. The forces of domination determine, among other things, the aesthetic aspect of the body and propagate what is healthy and beautiful and what is not. A firm, young and strong body, which athletes have, is socially accepted, while a limp and weak body is rejected as socially unacceptable and unhealthy. However, the body over which disciplinary control is exercised can also be an instrument of resistance to the ruling ideology, as Fiske explains:

“Despite the disciplinary use of the body to embody and textualize, the body remains an extremely uncertain space of social control, so society is forced to develop a powerful and comprehensive apparatus to deal with it. Jouissance is theoretically explained as a moment of pleasure in which the body is freed from social and cultural control.” (Fisk, 2001: 111)11 

Fiske points out that in addition to the satisfaction that threatens the social order, pain can also be threatening, and that pain is a means of social control. In competitive, martial arts, pain can be a spectacular physical experience, a victory over control and the norms established by the dominant ideology. Fiske claims that emphasizing a beautiful body in sports is a depoliticized ideological glorification of physical labor in capitalism.

Ruth has the opportunity to indulge in plaisir of adapting to the ruling ideology, but she rejects it and her instinctive, carnival nature prevails. Ruth leaves life in a small American university town and stays in England where she indulges in jouissance of the physical, active, aggressive and exaggerated pleasures. She enters Rabelais’s (Bakhtin, 1984) world of exaggeration, where the body and bodily functions come to the fore, where the sublime and the low, the secular and the sacred, collide, where there is no rank or social hierarchy. Her exaggerated sexuality and eroticism lead her through flirting and exchanging bodily pleasures with her husband’s brothers, and then it drives her to accept the role of a Soho prostitute. Fiske explains that this reversal of rejection of the sublime and  acceptance of the low is “a testimony to the 
power of the ‘low’ to resolutely demand the right to its place in culture.” (Fiske, 2001:97)12 Ruth inverts social discipline and social norms by replacing her existing family, whose members are her husband and children, with a new, different family, whose members are her father-in-law and brothers-in-law: 

“Lenny: We’d find you an apartment.
 Pause.
 Ruth: An apartment?
 Lenny: Yes.
 Ruth: Where?
 Lenny: In the town. (Pause.) But you would live here, with us.
 Max: Yes. This would be your home. Here, in the family circle.
 Lenny: You’d just hop over to that apartment for a few hours a night. That is all.
 Max: Just a few hours.
 Lenny: That way you would earn enough money to be able to support yourself.” 
(Pinter, 1982: 199)13

Emphasis on work and the ability to support oneself indicates the Marxistic claim that work is an essential feature of a human being, and in the case of Ruth, it indicates the completion of her being. Ruth finds satisfaction in rejecting the overall patriarchal ideology and understanding of the family, all moral and social norms, creates her own meanings and based on them creates a new, completely different reality. With such thinking and acting it represents resistance and a direct threat to the existing moral, legal and aesthetic ruling forces, and indicates how fragile social control is.

In the drama No Man’s Land, Hirst indulges in jouissance, constantly pouring champagne and whiskey and being in a state of drunkenness. By intoxication, that is, by excessive indulgence in bodily pleasure, Hirst, although a member of the upper class, poses an oposition to the norms prescribed as acceptable by the bearers of social control. However, although the bourgeoisie does not approve of excessive enjoyment of the bodily pleasures of the aristocracy, it does not punish or sanction its members because although they pose a threat to the imposed norms, they do not pose a threat to the existing social order at the top. Hirst tries to overcome his grief and spiritual pain for the past by losing himself and fleeing to jouissance of “no man’s land”, which indicates the decadence and fragility of the existing social order. Despite being a member of the ruling elite and a supporter of the good old days, Hirst, according to his memories, of which we are never sure whether they are real or fictional, enjoyed, in his youth, the jouissance of physical and spiritual pleasures of distorting social norms. His jouissance is reflected in a love affair which he nurtured with Spooner’s wife. Emphasizing the bodily jouissance of liberation from self-control and control of society is reflected in the emphasis on the corporality of Spooner’s wife: “Hirst: Her ardor was, at least in my entire experience, unparalleled.” (Pinter, 1982: 265)14

The glorification of Spooner’s physicality and the control of social norms over his body, and thus over his entire life, is reflected in Hirst’s description of Spooner’s athletic engagement: Hirst:

“You have always been preoccupied with your physical ... f itness ... is it true? With full right, full right. You were a really well-built guy. A natural athlete. Medals, plaques, your name was written in golden letters.” (Pinter, 1982: 265) 

Like Davis (Caretaker), Spooner does not find his way between plaisir adjustment and jouissance resistance, and remains lost in modern society.

In the drama Betrayal, Emma, Robert and Jerry, enjoy and suffer the jouissance of avoiding social norms. Their entire world is set in Bakhtin’s atmosphere of reversal of established rules. At the very beginning, Jerry’s drunkenness and loss of self in his  fascination with his best friend’s wife stand out, which violates the rules of a healthy, sober body, as well as patriarchal moral norms:

„Jerry:  Look at the way you’re looking at me. I can’t wait for you, I’m bowled over, I’m totally knocked out, you dazzle me, you jewel, my jewel, I can’t ever sleep again, no, listen, it’s the truth, I won’t walk, I’ll be a cripple, I’ll descend, I’ll diminish, into total paralysis, my life is in your hands, that’s what you’re banishing me to, a state of catatonia, do you know the state of catatonia? Do you? Do you? The state 
of . . . where the reigning prince is the prince of emptiness, the prince of absence, the prince of desolation. I love you.” (Pinter, 2013: 51)15 

Jerry’s overemphasized feelings indicate jouissance of liberation from social determination and control, and he reaches Bakhtin’s notion of freedom and Barthes’ sense of jouissance. Resistance to traditional norms is reflected in various aspects of betrayal that takes place in all directions and is contrary to socially desirable forms of behavior and unwritten moral expectations. The body as the seat of energy and 
the battlefield of struggle between power and avoidance, discipline and liberation reflects society and struggles that take place in it on different levels, introducing, as Fiske points out, carnival degradation that lowers everything to equality of bodily principles.

4  Original text: „Ali imamo rešenje za tebe. Možemo da te sterilizujemo.” Translation used in the paper has been done by the author.
5  Original text: „Probudi ga. Zabodi mu iglu u oko.” Translation used in the paper has been done by the author.

6  Original text: „Eston: Protumaraću malo ulicom. Malo...malo da pazarim. Čovek je ostavio ovih dana jednu bušilicu tamo. Hteo bih to da vidim, na svaki način.” Translation used in the paper has been done by the author.
7  Original text: „Ko je taj idiot da meni naređuje? Među nama nema razlike. Nije on moj gazda. Nije on ništa više od mene.” Translation used in the paper is done by the author.
8  Original text: „Dejvis: Neka sam ja i skitnica, ali imam prava kao ostali ljudi.” Translation used in the paper has been done by the aurhor.

9  Original text: „Znaš, mislio sam, jednoga dana, kada se prebacim donde, mogu da pogledam kako stoji stvar na Vembliju. Jer ti mečevi, razumeš? Ljudi su im potrebni, da trče po terenu, razumeš, da paze. Ili još nešto, još nešto bih mogao, mogao bih da se spustim dole do Keningtona. Jer svi ti veliki sportski tereni, pa to je ko jedan i jedan, potrebni su ljudi, da čuvaju igralište, to njima treba, bez toga prosto ne mogu. Blisko zdravoj pameti, je li? O, sve bi bilo u redu... samo kad bih.... uh... pa samo... samo da to uradim. (Pauza) Samo da odem tamo već jednom.”  Translation used in the paper has been done by the author.

10 Original text: „...E pa, u njenom predlogu nije bilo ničeg tako neobičnog i ja na takav predlog obično pristanem. Hoću da kažem, pristao bih ja i tada da su uslovi bili normalni. Samo, nevolja je bila u tome što se ona raspadala od sifilisa.Morao sam da je odbijem. Ali dama je nastavila da navaljuje na mene tamo pod svodom. Niko od mene ne može da očekuje da, u datim uslovima, pristanem na njeno navaljivanje. I – kada se uzme u obzir – jasno je da sam morao da je tresnem. Prošlo mi je tada kroz glavu da je se otarasim. Razumete me – da je ucmekam. Činjenica je da bi to – mislim na ubistvo – bila vrlo prosta stvar...” Translation used in the paper has been done by the author.
11 Original text: „Uprkos disciplinskom korišćenju tela da bi se zakon otelovio i tekstualizovao, telo ostaje krajnje nesiguran prostor društvene kontrole, pa je društvo zbog toga primorano da razvija moćan i sveobuhvatan aparat da bi se s njime nosilo. Jouissance se teorijski objašnjava kao trenutak zadovoljstva u kome se telo oslobađa društvene i kulturne kontrole.” 
Translation used in the paper is done by the author.

12 Original text: „predstavlja svedočanstvo o moći „niskog” da odlučno zahteva pravo na svoje mesto u kulturi.”  Translation used in the paper has been done by the author.
13 Original text: „Leni: Mi bismo vam našli stan. Pauza. Rut: Stan? Leni: Da. Rut: Gde? Leni: U gradu. (Pauza.) Ali živeli biste ovde, sa nama. Maks: Dabome. Ovo bi bio vaš dom. Ovde u krugu porodice. Leni: Samo biste skoknuli do onog stana na nekoliko sati – noću. To je sve. Maks: Nekoliko sati samo. Leni: Tako biste zaradili dovoljno novca da možete sami da se izdržavate.” Translation used in the paper has been done by the author.

14 Original text: „Hirst: Njena vatrenost je bila, barem u mom celokupnom iskustvu, bez premca.” Translation used in the paper is done by the author.

15 Original text: „Džeri: Pogledaj kako me gledaš. Ne mogu te dočekati, poražen sam, totalno sam nokautiran, zaslepljuješ me, dragulju, dragulju moj, ne mogu više da spavam, ne, slušaj, istina je, neću moći da hodam, biću bogalj, spustiću se, smanjiću se, u totalnu paralizu, moj život je u tvojim rukama, tu me proteravaš, u stanje katatonije, znaš li kakvo je to stanje katatonije? Znaš li? Znaš li? Stanje . . . gde princ koji vlada jeste princ praznine, princ odsustva, princ pustoši. Volim te.” Translation used in the paper has been done by the author.

CONCLUDING REMARKS

Pinter’s drama characters indulge in popular jouissance and plaisir pleasures that significantly mark their way of life in a hegemonic society. Each of them strives to fulfill  plaisir of recognition and confirmation in the society that surrounds them. Since they belong to different class groups, from the working class to the upper class, their adjustments to the system are different, because there are different requirements in relation to different class affiliations, and each of them has its own aspirations within the social class to which he belongs. Starting from the general to the individual, depending on their own interests, at an everyday level, Pinter’s protagonists adapt or oppose given norms. Also, in an attempt to realize their urges, they occasionally indulge in the pleasures of losing their own emotions and desires, that is, the carnival pleasures of exaggeration, in the sense in which Bakhtin explains them. Starting from the general to the individual point of view, modern society allows members of the upper class and the upper middle class to indulge in pleasures,  even if it means opposing prescribed norms and creating new meanings, because they do not threaten the system, but are an established part of the ruling ideology, to a greater or lesser extent. Hirst, Petey, Meg, Teddy and Emma, indulge in retreat, drunkenness, promiscuity, and exaggeration, but are not punished for their actions. In contrast, members of the subordinate, working class, are treated differently by the ruling system, which seeks to control them in order to maintain its own power and accumulate capital. Control implies the implementation of disciplinary activities that define, determine and regulate the pleasures of subordinates, and in that sense the satisfaction of an individual body is considered a threat to a political 
body, which consequently entails a certain type of punishment: 

“Excessive pleasures are always a threat to subordinate groups (subordinate in the sense of class, sex, race, or any other sense), the threat becomes particularly pronounced, so disciplinary, if not repressive action is imposed as almost inevitable.” (Fisk, 2001: 90)16 

Pinter’s protagonists, members of the lower classes, in accordance with the above, to a greater or lesser extent successfully fight the system, but at the same time they are disciplined or punished for the pleasures they indulge in. Gus, although in the service of the system, expresses his suspicion of the same, and thus commits the most serious offense, for which he is sentenced to death. However, Pinter goes 
a step further in showing the relationship between popular pleasures, the overall population and the power bloc. Stanley, who indulges in the evasive pleasure of escape, is not doomed to physical death, but his personality, the power of reason, moreover the power of speech, is removed. Disciplinary control measures do not only include members of the lower strata of society. They expand and encompass 
everything and everyone, regardless of class affiliation, and depending on the protagonists’ individual popular strengths, the measures have a stronger or weaker impact.

16  Original text: „Prekomerna zadovoljstva oduvek su pretnja društvenoj kontroli, ali kada ta zadovoljstva pripadaju podređenim grupama (podređenim u smislu klase, pola, rase, ili bilo kom drugom smislu), pretnja postaje posebno izrazita, pa se disciplinsko, ako ne i represivno delovanje, nameće kao gotovo neizbežno.” Translation used in the paper has been done by the author.