The Four Spent the Day Together centers on individuals chasing after fresh starts, trying to break free from drugs or toxic relationships, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. The author frequently uses the phrase "fresh start", making it deliberately jaded through constant reiteration. Sentences like "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They chose to begin anew" recur in the text. Meanwhile, Kraus herself appears to be undertaking her individual reinvention, as this presents as a new kind of book – observational, authentically narrative. But then it proves to be packed with the recurring issues and aesthetics as past novels.
From Chance Novelist to Cult Classic
Chris Kraus started out as an visual artist who became a writer unintentionally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, structured as letters to an unreceptive lover, converting intimate women's literature from humiliation into defiance. She continued writing, but the following three fascinating and rebarbative novels missed the impact and rawness that the letter form brought to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her role as a maverick maker who had become a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was much discussion on housing investments. It is logical that she presently aims to try out different types of content, directing her gaze to external narratives, at a time when she asserts that contemporary political climate renders personal narrative unnecessary.
Multiple Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, spanning several time periods – each trapped by their pasts. We encounter the tale of Emma and Jasper, representations of the author's parents, transitioning from the New York borough to a pastoral setting. Additionally the account of Kraus, in the persona of a figure named Catt Greene, reckoning with the belated success of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse Paul. Finally the narrative of a homicide of one directionless individual by another in a community long abandoned by liberal ideals only a short distance from Catt's cottage in the Minnesota countryside.
For this reader fond of refined literature of the kind the author herself typically rejects, I was enchanted by the narrative style of the first section.
As a reader who favors crafted language of the variety that Kraus herself often disregards, I was seduced by the literary tone of the first section. It possesses a novel degree of detail that makes room for minutiae, like the container that the youthful Catt pries out of frozen water at the beginning of the narrative, assisted by her cherished parent. "I found an ice toy!" she says; "a nice toy", he answers, "the nuanced interpretations of terms circulating in their speech like hard candy". Kraus writes Emma's narrative with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not entirely her own."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was fated to feel let down when I expected this fresh tone could continue through the novel. Kraus says here that she dislikes the pleasure audiences such as myself have derived from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disjunction, to the messy artistic approach she shares with her inspiration author Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her previous novels reasserts itself in the central part. Catt is working on refurbishing three dozen dilapidated units in the city's most challenging districts while shuttling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unsuccessful in assisting her husband manage his alcohol use. She experiences powerlessness as Paul moves between underfunded jobs as an substance abuse counselor in a world propelled by the rage and anxiety that drives Trump's victory. There are several pages about the protagonist facing cancellation on a platform, her occupation changed from "novelist" to "landlord" on Wikipedia. The author still appears to care a little too much about this. On one occasion she remarks that she's investigating the murder so that before departing the state, "she may grasp something about an America that her Twitter detractors would fail to comprehend, would not even see".
The Killing Story
Thus we arrive to the homicide in question – and the referenced day experienced by the victim with the murderer and his companions. The author possesses excellent raw material, and knows hour by hour what transpired when the victim Brandon came to see Brittney after meeting her on an app where she offered adult photos. He anticipated intimacy but seems affably to have spent the day with her companions, mooching around getting his car mended and funding treats and narcotics, before being shot by her romantic interest Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has often been institutionalized for violent rage.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
Catt gets obsessed by the narrative, and I was fascinated by the way that her twin drives towards responsible documentation and daring boundary-pushing clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to explore more thoroughly her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is Brittney herself, who gains dimension in part due to the protagonist's connection to her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman spiraling out of control in a troubled, forgotten town. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in jail, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. This entire part feels curiously unresolved, to the degree that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
