The Four Spent the Day Together is populated with individuals chasing after fresh starts, struggling to escape addictions or toxic relationships, only to find hope curdling into aggression. Kraus repeatedly invokes the phrase "clean slate", rendering it intentionally weary through recurring use. Examples include "He aimed to start over" and "They opted for a clean break" 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 – observational, truly literary. However it turns out to be laden with the same dilemmas and styles as earlier books.
From Chance Novelist to Cult Classic
Chris Kraus started out as an artist who entered the literary world somewhat by chance with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, structured as letters to an unreceptive lover, converting personal female narrative from humiliation into assassination. She continued writing, but the following three engaging and challenging novels lacked the power and directness that the letter form brought to the voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her identity as a renegade artist who had turned into a major property owner, so there was significant attention on housing investments. It is logical that she presently aims to explore different types of content, turning outward to the experiences of others, at a time when she asserts that contemporary political climate renders personal narrative redundant.
Three Generations, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, covering several time periods – none able to break free from their histories. There is the narrative about characters Emma and Jasper, versions of Kraus's parents, moving from the Bronx to rural Connecticut. Then there is the narrative of the author, in the character of a figure named Catt Greene, confronting the belated success of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her partner struggling with addiction Paul. The third thread involves the story of the murder of one lost young man by another in a locality long abandoned by forward-thinking policies only 80 miles from Catt's cottage in the Minnesota countryside.
From my perspective as a reader fond of polished prose of the sort the author herself often avoids, I was captivated by the narrative style of the first section.
As a reader who favors honed writing of the kind that Kraus usually avoids, I was won over by the novelistic voice of the first section. There is a new quality of attentiveness that accommodates trivial aspects, like the bucket that the protagonist as a child frees from the ice at the opening of the book, 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". The author narrates Emma's story with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not precisely her dream."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was fated to feel let down when I expected this fresh tone could continue through the novel. Kraus says here that she is annoyed by the enjoyment audiences such as myself have gotten from I Love Dick; she's committed to fragmentation, to the messy artistic approach she has in common with her idol Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her earlier works comes back in the central part. Catt Greene is working on refurbishing three dozen dilapidated units in the city's most challenging districts while moving between the Midwest and the West Coast, failing to help her husband curb his addiction. She is overwhelmed as Paul transitions between low-resource employment as an substance abuse counselor in a world propelled by the rage and anxiety that powers Trump's victory. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt being cancelled on a platform, her occupation changed from "novelist" to "landlord" on Wikipedia. Kraus still seems to be overly concerned about this. In a moment she remarks that she's looking into the killing so that before exiting the region, "she might be able to learn something about an the nation that her online critics would fail to comprehend, would overlook entirely".
The Homicide Account
Thus we arrive to the homicide in question – and the eponymous day passed by the murdered individual with the perpetrator and his companions. The author possesses great source material, and details moment by moment what transpired when Brandon came to see Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she offered adult photos. He anticipated intimacy but appears congenially to have passed the day alongside her friends, mooching around fixing his automobile and covering the cost of food and substances, before being killed by gunfire by her romantic interest Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has frequently been hospitalised for aggressive outbursts.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
The protagonist becomes fixated by the narrative, and I found myself captivated by the way that her twin drives towards accurate chronicling and reckless transgression wrestle in this part. Yet I wished her to explore more thoroughly her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is Brittney herself, who comes alive partly through Catt's identification with her – another bright, bullied girl derailing in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus notes that Catt converses with Brittney in jail, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. This entire part feels oddly unfinished, to the extent that her narrative ends almost mid-par
