The Four Spent the Day Together centers on protagonists pursuing fresh starts, attempting to leave behind substance abuse or abusive marriages, only to witness hope devolve into conflict. Kraus frequently uses the phrase "new beginning", transforming it into deliberately jaded through recurring use. Sentences like "He could make a fresh start" and "They chose to begin anew" recur in the narrative. At the same time, Kraus herself is embarking on her own fresh start, as this seems a new kind of book – fact-based, authentically narrative. However it proves to be filled with the familiar conflicts and aesthetics as her previous works.
From Accidental Writer to Cult Classic
Chris Kraus was originally an artist who entered the literary world somewhat by chance with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, structured as letters to an unreceptive lover, transforming intimate women's literature from self-debasement into defiance. She continued writing, but the three subsequent fascinating and rebarbative novels did not possess the shock and immediacy that the correspondence format brought to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her identity as a nonconformist creator who had become a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was much discussion on property transactions. It is logical that she currently desires to try out new kinds of material, directing her gaze to other people's stories, at a time when she asserts that contemporary political climate turns intimate literature obsolete.
Three Generations, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, covering multiple eras – all unable to escape their backgrounds. We encounter the story of Emma and Jasper, versions of the author's parents, transitioning from the Bronx to the Connecticut countryside. There is the story of Kraus herself, in the guise of Catt Greene, grappling with the late recognition of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her substance-dependent spouse Paul. And there is the account of a killing of one directionless individual by another in a locality largely deserted by forward-thinking policies only 80 miles from Catt's cottage in rural Minnesota.
For this reader fond of polished prose of the type Kraus herself typically rejects, I was captivated by the literary tone of the initial segment.
Being a reader who favors honed writing of the style that Kraus tends to eschew, I was won over by the storytelling approach of the first section. There is a fresh level of observation that accommodates minutiae, like the pail that the youthful Catt pries out of frozen water at the opening of the book, assisted by her cherished parent. "Look, an ice toy!" she says; "a nice toy", he answers, "the elliptical meanings of words rolling around in their mouths like sweet treats". Kraus writes Emma's story with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not hers, exactly."
Frustration and Disruption
I was destined to be disappointed when I hoped this fresh tone could continue through the novel. Kraus notes here that she dislikes the pleasure audiences such as myself have gotten from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disruption, to the unpolished style she shares with her idol Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her previous novels comes back in the middle section. Catt Greene is attempting to do up three dozen dilapidated units in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while traveling between two different states, failing to help Paul control his drinking. She feels helpless as her spouse cycles through underfunded jobs as an substance abuse counselor in a world driven by the hostility and dread that drives Trump's victory. A significant portion discusses about Catt's social media ostracism on social media, her listed profession modified from "novelist" to "property owner" on Wikipedia. She still gives the impression to care a little too much about this. At one point she says that she's researching the homicide so that before exiting the region, "she could potentially understand something about an the nation that her Twitter detractors would be unable to grasp, would not even perceive".
The Murder Narrative
Thus we arrive to the homicide in question – and the titular day spent by the murdered individual with the perpetrator and his associates. Kraus has compelling foundational content, and reconstructs step by step what happened when a man named Brandon came to see Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she marketed explicit images. He was hoping for sex but seems affably to have spent the day in the company of her associates, loitering getting his car mended and covering the cost of food and substances, before being shot by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has repeatedly received inpatient care for violent rage.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
Catt gets obsessed by the account, and I found myself captivated by the way that her twin drives towards responsible documentation and reckless transgression clash in this segment. But I'd have liked her to go further into her own obsessions here. The standout figure is Brittney, who gains dimension partly through the protagonist's connection to her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a difficult, overlooked locality. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in prison, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The complete segment feels curiously unresolved, to the extent that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
