This latest work is populated with characters seeking clean slates, trying to break free from substance abuse or abusive marriages, only to find hope curdling into violence. Chris Kraus often employs the phrase "fresh start", transforming it into willfully cynical through recurring use. Examples include "He could make a fresh start" and "They opted for a clean break" appear throughout the narrative. Meanwhile, the author herself seems to be making her individual reinvention, because this seems a novel form of writing – observational, genuinely novelistic. Yet it turns out to be laden with the familiar conflicts and styles as earlier books.
From Unplanned Author to Cult Classic
Chris Kraus was originally an artist who transitioned to writing almost accidentally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, which was composed of missives to a distant beloved, transforming personal female narrative from abjection into defiance. She persisted as a writer, but the three subsequent compelling and abrasive novels lacked the power and directness that the letter form infused into the tone of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her identity as a renegade artist who had evolved into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was significant attention on housing investments. It is logical that she currently desires to experiment with new kinds of material, directing her gaze to external narratives, 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, encompassing several time periods – each trapped by their pasts. There is the story of Emma and Jasper, based on her own mother and father, relocating from the New York borough to a pastoral setting. Then there is the account of Kraus, in the persona of protagonist Catt Greene, confronting the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her addict husband a man named Paul. Finally the narrative of a homicide of one troubled youth by another in a community largely deserted by progressive politics only a brief drive from Catt's rural residence in rural Minnesota.
From my perspective as a reader attracted to honed writing of the type the author herself tends to eschew, I was enchanted by the literary tone of the opening part.
As someone who reads drawn to precise prose of the kind that Kraus tends to eschew, I was won over by the storytelling approach of the initial part. There is a novel degree of detail that accommodates minutiae, like the pail that the youthful Catt dislodges from ice at the opening of the book, aided by her cherished parent. "Look, an ice toy!" she says; "a lovely toy", he responds, "the nuanced interpretations of terms tumbling in their mouths like hard candy". She tells Emma's story with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not precisely her dream."
Frustration and Disruption
I was fated to feel let down when I expected this different style could last out the book. The author states here that she resents the satisfaction those who appreciate polished prose have gotten from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disjunction, to the messy artistic approach she echoes from her hero author Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her earlier works returns in the central part. The protagonist 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 Paul curb his addiction. She experiences powerlessness as her spouse moves between underfunded jobs as an substance abuse counselor in a world driven by the rage and anxiety that drives an electoral success. A significant portion discusses about Catt's social media ostracism on Twitter, her occupation changed from "author" to "property owner" on Wikipedia. She still gives the impression to be overly concerned about this. At one point she remarks that she's looking into the killing so that before leaving Minnesota, "she could potentially understand something about an the United States that her Twitter detractors would be unable to grasp, would not even perceive".
The Homicide Account
Thus we arrive to the murder itself – and the titular day passed by the victim with the killer and his companions. Kraus utilizes compelling foundational content, and reconstructs step by step what occurred as Brandon came to meet Brittney after connecting via an application where she marketed explicit images. He was hoping for sex but seems amiably to have occupied the day in the company of her associates, mooching around fixing his automobile and covering the cost of food and substances, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's partner Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has often been institutionalized for aggressive outbursts.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
Catt develops an obsession by the account, and I found myself captivated by the way that her twin drives towards responsible documentation and daring boundary-pushing wrestle in this part. Yet I wished her to explore more thoroughly her individual preoccupations here. The most interesting character is the character Brittney, who becomes vivid partially because of the protagonist's connection to her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a troubled, forgotten town. The author informs us that Catt speaks to Brittney in detention, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. The whole section feels strangely incomplete, to the point that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
