The Four Spent the Day Together features individuals seeking clean slates, attempting to leave behind substance abuse or toxic relationships, only to see hope turn into aggression. Chris Kraus often employs the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into deliberately jaded through recurring use. Sentences like "He could make a fresh start" and "They chose to begin anew" are scattered across the narrative. At the same time, the author herself seems to be making her own fresh start, because this appears a novel form of writing – observational, genuinely novelistic. Yet it proves to be laden with the same dilemmas and approaches as her previous works.
From Chance Novelist to Cult Classic
Chris Kraus was originally an creative who transitioned to writing almost accidentally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, which was composed of letters to an unreceptive lover, transforming personal female narrative from abjection into assassination. She persisted as a writer, but the next trio of fascinating and rebarbative novels did not possess the impact and rawness that the correspondence format infused into the tone of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her identity as a nonconformist creator who had become a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was much discussion on property transactions. It is logical that she now wants to experiment with different types of content, directing her gaze to other people's stories, at a time when she claims that contemporary political climate renders personal narrative unnecessary.
Multiple Generations, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, encompassing three generations – all unable to escape their pasts. There is the tale of a couple named Emma and Jasper, representations of the author's parents, relocating from the New York borough to rural Connecticut. Then there is the account of Kraus, in the guise of a figure named Catt Greene, grappling with the belated success of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her addict husband her husband Paul. The third thread involves the narrative of a homicide of one directionless individual by another in a community mostly forsaken by liberal ideals only 80 miles from Catt's rural residence in the Minnesota countryside.
As a reader drawn to refined literature of the kind Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the initial segment.
As someone who reads who appreciates honed writing of the kind that Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was captivated by the literary tone of the initial part. It possesses a new quality of attentiveness that accommodates minutiae, like the pail that the protagonist as a child pries out of frozen water at the beginning of the narrative, assisted by her cherished parent. "Look, an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a nice toy", he responds, "the elliptical meanings of words rolling around in their mouths like sweet treats". The author narrates 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 bound to become frustrated when I hoped this different style could continue through the novel. Kraus notes here that she dislikes the enjoyment those who appreciate polished prose have gotten from I Love Dick; she's devoted to fragmentation, to the unpolished style she echoes from her idol writer Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her previous novels comes back in the middle section. The protagonist is trying to renovate multiple decrepit residences in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while traveling between two different states, failing to help Paul control his drinking. She feels helpless as her spouse moves between poorly supported positions as an recovery specialist in a society propelled by the rage and anxiety that powers Trump's victory. There are several pages about the protagonist facing cancellation on a platform, her listed profession modified from "author" to "property owner" on Wikipedia. Kraus still seems to care a little too much about this. At one point she says 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 social media opponents would fail to comprehend, would not even perceive".
The Killing Story
So then we come to the actual killing – and the eponymous day experienced by the murdered individual with the perpetrator and his associates. Kraus has great source material, and reconstructs step by step what transpired when Brandon came to see Brittney after meeting her on an app where she marketed explicit images. He was hoping for sex but seems affably to have spent 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 boyfriend Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has repeatedly received inpatient care for fits of anger.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
Catt develops an obsession by the account, and I was fascinated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards accurate chronicling and reckless transgression clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to go further into her personal fixations here. The standout figure is the character Brittney, who becomes vivid partly through Catt seeing herself in her – another bright, bullied girl derailing in a struggling, neglected community. Kraus tells us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in detention, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The whole section feels curiously unresolved, to the degree that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
