The Four Spent the Day Together features characters seeking fresh starts, trying to break free from substance abuse or toxic relationships, only to witness hope devolve into violence. Chris Kraus often employs the phrase "clean slate", rendering it willfully cynical through constant reiteration. Phrases such as "He could make a fresh start" and "They chose to begin anew" are scattered across the story. At the same time, the author herself is embarking on her personal new beginning, as this presents as a novel form of writing – documentarian, truly literary. But then it proves to be laden with the same dilemmas and aesthetics as earlier books.
From Chance Novelist to Cult Classic
Kraus began as an creative who entered the literary world almost accidentally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, which was composed of letters to an unreceptive lover, converting personal female narrative from abjection into rebellion. She persisted as a writer, but the following three fascinating and rebarbative novels lacked the power and directness that the epistolary style brought to the tone of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her role as a nonconformist creator who had become a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was considerable focus on housing investments. It is logical that she now wants to experiment with new kinds of material, directing her gaze to the experiences of others, at a time when she claims that contemporary political climate makes confessional writing redundant.
Several Eras, Collective Unavoidable Background
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, encompassing three generations – each trapped by their pasts. We encounter the narrative about Emma and Jasper, versions of her own mother and father, relocating from the Bronx to a pastoral setting. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the persona of Catt Greene, confronting the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her partner struggling with addiction her husband Paul. The third thread involves the narrative of a homicide of one directionless individual by another in a locality long abandoned by forward-thinking policies only a short distance from the protagonist's home in rural Minnesota.
From my perspective as a reader attracted to refined literature of the type the author herself often avoids, I was captivated by the literary tone of the initial segment.
As someone who reads drawn to crafted language of the variety that Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was captivated by the literary tone of the first section. It possesses a fresh level of observation that makes room for trivial aspects, like the container that the protagonist as a child dislodges from ice at the opening of the book, assisted by her cherished parent. "Look, an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a great plaything", he replies, "the elliptical meanings of words rolling around in their mouths like sweet treats". The author narrates the tale of Emma with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not hers, exactly."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was destined to be disappointed when I hoped this new voice could persist to the end. The author states here that she dislikes the pleasure readers like me have derived from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disjunction, to the untidy aesthetics she echoes from her hero author Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her earlier works reasserts itself in the second segment. Catt is trying to renovate multiple decrepit residences in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while traveling between Minnesota and LA, unable to aid Paul control his drinking. She experiences powerlessness as Paul cycles through underfunded jobs as an addiction therapist in a environment propelled by the anger and fear that drives an electoral success. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt being cancelled on social media, her listed profession modified from "novelist" to "real estate holder" on the online encyclopedia. The author still appears to be overly concerned about this. On one occasion she states that she's looking into the killing so that before leaving Minnesota, "she may grasp something about an the United States that her online critics would not understand, would not even see".
The Murder Narrative
So then we come to the actual killing – and the eponymous day experienced by the victim with the murderer and his friends. The author possesses great source material, and knows hour by hour what occurred as Brandon came to meet Brittney after meeting her on an app where she sold sex pictures. He sought a sexual encounter but appears congenially to have passed the day with her companions, loitering fixing his automobile and covering the cost of food and substances, before being shot by her romantic interest Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has often been institutionalized for aggressive outbursts.
Fascination and Incompletion
Catt gets obsessed by the story, and I was fascinated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards ethical reporting and daring boundary-pushing clash in this segment. But I'd have liked her to go further into her own obsessions here. The compelling persona is the character Brittney, who comes alive partly through Catt's identification with her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a struggling, neglected community. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in prison, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. This entire part feels strangely incomplete, to the degree that her narrative ends almost mid-par
