The Four Spent the Day Together centers on individuals pursuing clean slates, trying to break free from substance abuse or abusive marriages, only to find hope curdling into aggression. Chris Kraus repeatedly invokes the phrase "fresh start", making it willfully cynical through recurring use. Examples include "He aimed to start over" and "They opted for a clean break" are scattered across the story. Meanwhile, Kraus herself seems to be making her own fresh start, as this appears a different type of work – documentarian, genuinely novelistic. Yet it proves to be packed with the same dilemmas and aesthetics as past novels.
From Chance Novelist to Iconic Work
Chris Kraus started out as an creative who transitioned to writing almost accidentally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, which was composed of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, transforming personal female narrative from self-debasement into assassination. She kept producing books, but the next trio of compelling and abrasive novels missed the power and directness that the letter form infused into the tone of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her role as a maverick maker who had evolved into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was much discussion on property transactions. It follows that she now wants to try out new kinds of material, directing her gaze to external narratives, at a time when she states that contemporary political climate turns intimate literature redundant.
Three Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, covering multiple eras – each trapped by their backgrounds. The book includes the tale of characters Emma and Jasper, versions of the author's parents, moving from the Bronx to rural Connecticut. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the guise of protagonist Catt Greene, confronting the late recognition of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her substance-dependent spouse a man named Paul. Finally the story of the murder of one directionless individual by another in a community largely deserted by liberal ideals only a short distance from Catt's rural residence in a remote part of Minnesota.
For this reader attracted to polished prose of the type Kraus tends to eschew, I was seduced by the narrative style of the first section.
As a reader who appreciates crafted language of the style that Kraus herself usually avoids, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the first section. There is a novel degree of detail that makes room for small details, like the bucket that the youthful Catt pries out of frozen water at the start of the story, helped by her beloved father. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she exclaims; "a nice toy", he replies, "the ambiguous meanings of language tumbling in their mouths like piece candy". The author narrates Emma's narrative with interest and closeness. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not precisely her dream."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was destined to be disappointed when I wished this new voice could persist to the end. Kraus says here that she is annoyed by the enjoyment those who appreciate polished prose have gotten from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disruption, to the untidy aesthetics she echoes from her idol writer Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her previous novels comes back in the central part. Catt Greene is attempting to do up three dozen dilapidated units in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while traveling between Minnesota and LA, unsuccessful in assisting Paul control his drinking. She is overwhelmed as Paul moves between low-resource employment as an substance abuse counselor in a society fueled by the hostility and dread that powers a political win. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt's social media ostracism on social media, her professional designation altered from "writer" to "landlord" on a reference site. The author still appears to care a little too much about this. In a moment she says that she's researching the homicide so that before departing the state, "she could potentially understand something about an the nation that her social media opponents would fail to comprehend, would not even perceive".
The Homicide Account
So then we come to the murder itself – and the eponymous day passed by the murdered individual with the murderer and his associates. Kraus has compelling foundational content, and reconstructs step by step what transpired when the victim Brandon came to visit Brittney after connecting via an application where she sold sex pictures. He was hoping for sex but seems amiably to have occupied the day with her companions, mooching around fixing his automobile and covering the cost of food and substances, before being murdered by her romantic interest Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has often been institutionalized for fits of anger.
Fascination and Incompletion
Catt develops an obsession by the story, and I found myself captivated by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards accurate chronicling and daring boundary-pushing tussle in this section. Yet I wished her to delve deeper into her personal fixations here. The compelling persona is the character Brittney, who comes alive partly through the protagonist's connection to her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus notes that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in prison, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The complete segment feels strangely incomplete, to the degree that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
