The Four Spent the Day Together is populated with protagonists seeking new beginnings, struggling to escape addictions or abusive marriages, only to see hope turn into aggression. Chris Kraus frequently uses the phrase "new beginning", transforming it into willfully cynical through its repetitions. Sentences like "He could make a fresh start" and "They decided to make a fresh start" appear throughout the story. At the same time, the author herself appears to be undertaking her own fresh start, since this presents as a novel form of writing – observational, genuinely novelistic. Yet it proves to be packed with the familiar conflicts and styles as past novels.
From Chance Novelist to Iconic Work
Kraus was originally an visual artist who transitioned to writing somewhat by chance with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, which was composed of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, converting personal female narrative from humiliation into defiance. She kept producing books, but the next trio of fascinating and rebarbative novels lacked the power and directness that the correspondence format brought to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her identity as a nonconformist creator who had turned into a extensive real estate holder, so there was significant attention on housing investments. It makes sense that she presently aims to explore new kinds of material, looking outwards to external narratives, at a moment when she claims that current political era turns intimate literature obsolete.
Three Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, spanning multiple eras – all unable to escape their histories. We encounter the narrative about Emma and Jasper, based on the author's parents, relocating from the New York borough to a pastoral setting. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the guise of Catt Greene, grappling with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her addict husband a man named Paul. And there is the account of a killing of one troubled youth by another in a locality largely deserted by liberal ideals only 80 miles from Catt's rural residence in a remote part of Minnesota.
From my perspective as a reader attracted to honed writing of the type Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was captivated by the literary tone of the initial segment.
As someone who reads drawn to precise prose of the kind that Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was won over by the novelistic voice of the opening segment. It exhibits a novel degree of detail that makes room for trivial aspects, like the bucket that the young Catt frees from the ice at the opening of the book, aided by her adored dad. "Look, an ice toy!" she declares; "a great plaything", he responds, "the ambiguous meanings of language tumbling in their mouths like sweet treats". Kraus writes Emma's narrative with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not hers, exactly."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was bound to become frustrated when I expected this different style could continue through the novel. Kraus says here that she dislikes the satisfaction those who appreciate polished prose have taken from I Love Dick; she's devoted to fragmentation, to the unpolished style she shares with her hero author Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her previous novels comes back in the central part. The protagonist is trying to renovate 36 run-down apartments in the city's most challenging districts while moving between the Midwest and the West Coast, unable to aid Paul manage his alcohol use. She feels helpless as her spouse moves between low-resource employment as an addiction therapist in a society propelled by the rage and anxiety that drives an electoral success. A significant portion discusses about Catt's social media ostracism on Twitter, her occupation changed from "author" to "property owner" on the online encyclopedia. Kraus still seems to care a little too much about this. In a moment she says that she's looking into the killing so that before exiting the region, "she could potentially understand something about an the United States that her Twitter detractors would fail to comprehend, would overlook entirely".
The Murder Narrative
Thus we arrive to the murder itself – and the referenced day passed by the victim with the perpetrator and his companions. The author possesses great source material, and details moment by moment what happened when Brandon came to meet Brittney after connecting via an application where she marketed explicit images. He sought a sexual encounter but seems affably to have spent the day alongside her friends, wandering about fixing his automobile and covering the cost of food and substances, before being murdered by her romantic interest Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has frequently been hospitalised for violent rage.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
Catt develops an obsession by the account, and I found myself captivated by the way that her twin drives towards ethical reporting and audacious rule-breaking wrestle in this part. But I'd have liked her to explore more thoroughly her individual preoccupations here. The most interesting character is Brittney herself, who gains dimension in part due to Catt's identification with her – another bright, bullied girl spiraling out of control in a difficult, overlooked locality. The author informs us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in prison, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The complete segment feels curiously unresolved, to the degree that her narrative ends almost mid-par
