The Four Spent the Day Together is populated with individuals chasing after new beginnings, attempting to leave behind substance abuse or toxic relationships, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. The author repeatedly invokes the phrase "new beginning", rendering it willfully cynical through constant reiteration. Sentences like "He could make a fresh start" and "They decided to make a fresh start" appear throughout the story. At the same time, Kraus herself appears to be undertaking her personal new beginning, because this seems a novel form of writing – observational, truly literary. However it proves to be packed with the recurring issues and approaches as her previous works.
From Accidental Writer to Cult Classic
Chris Kraus began as an artist who became a writer unintentionally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, which was composed of letters to an unreceptive lover, elevating personal female narrative from self-debasement into rebellion. She continued writing, but the three subsequent fascinating and rebarbative novels lacked the power and directness that the epistolary style infused into the voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her position as a maverick maker who had turned into a extensive real estate holder, so there was much discussion on real estate deals. It is logical that she now wants to try out new kinds of material, looking outwards to the experiences of others, at a moment when she asserts that current political era makes confessional writing unnecessary.
Multiple Generations, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, spanning three generations – none able to break free from their backgrounds. We encounter the tale of Emma and Jasper, based on her own mother and father, relocating from the urban environment to rural Connecticut. There is the story of Kraus herself, in the persona of protagonist Catt Greene, grappling with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse a man named Paul. The third thread involves the account of a killing of one lost young man by another in a town largely deserted by progressive politics only 80 miles from the protagonist's home in a remote part of Minnesota.
For this reader drawn to polished prose of the type Kraus herself typically rejects, I was seduced by the narrative style of the first section.
Being a reader who appreciates precise prose of the style that the author usually avoids, I was captivated by the literary tone of the initial part. There is a fresh level of observation that allows space for small details, like the container that the protagonist as a child pries out of frozen water at the start of the story, aided by her cherished parent. "I found an ice toy!" she declares; "a great plaything", he responds, "the nuanced interpretations of terms rolling around in their mouths like hard candy". Kraus writes Emma's story with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not precisely her dream."
Frustration and Disruption
I was destined to be disappointed when I wished this different style could persist to the end. Kraus notes here that she resents the enjoyment those who appreciate polished prose have gotten from I Love Dick; she's devoted to fragmentation, to the messy artistic approach she shares with her inspiration writer Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her previous novels comes back in the middle section. Catt is working on refurbishing three dozen dilapidated units in the city's most challenging districts while traveling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unable to aid her husband manage his alcohol use. She feels helpless as Paul transitions between low-resource employment as an recovery specialist in a world fueled by the hostility and dread that underpins a political win. A significant portion discusses about Catt's social media ostracism on social media, her professional designation altered from "author" to "real estate holder" on Wikipedia. She still gives the impression to invest excessive emotion about this. In a moment she says that she's researching the homicide so that before departing the state, "she might be able to learn something about an the nation that her online critics would be unable to grasp, would not even perceive".
The Killing Story
So then we come to the murder itself – and the eponymous day passed by the victim with the perpetrator and his friends. Kraus utilizes excellent raw material, and details moment by moment what transpired when Brandon came to visit Brittney after meeting her on an app where she offered adult photos. He was hoping for sex but seems amiably to have occupied the day alongside her friends, loitering fixing his automobile and funding treats and narcotics, before being murdered by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has repeatedly received inpatient care for fits of anger.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
Catt gets obsessed by the story, and I was intrigued by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards responsible documentation and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to go further into her individual preoccupations here. The most interesting character is Brittney, who becomes vivid partly through the protagonist's connection to her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman going off the rails in a troubled, forgotten town. Kraus tells us that Catt converses with Brittney in detention, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The complete segment feels oddly unfinished, to the extent that her narrative ends almost mid-par
