This latest work is populated with individuals chasing after clean slates, attempting to leave behind drugs or toxic relationships, only to witness hope devolve into conflict. Kraus often employs the phrase "fresh start", making it intentionally weary through constant reiteration. Phrases such as "He could make a fresh start" and "They decided to make a fresh start" are scattered across the text. And yet, she appears to be undertaking her personal new beginning, since this seems a different type of work – documentarian, truly literary. Yet it reveals itself to be packed with the familiar conflicts and aesthetics as her previous works.
From Unplanned Author to Iconic Work
Chris Kraus started out as an artist who entered the literary world almost accidentally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, which was composed of letters to an unreceptive lover, transforming personal female narrative from abjection into rebellion. She persisted as a writer, but the following three fascinating and rebarbative novels lacked the impact and rawness that the epistolary style brought to the voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her position 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 now wants to experiment with fresh narrative sources, looking outwards to the experiences of others, at a time when she asserts that contemporary political climate turns intimate literature unnecessary.
Multiple Generations, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, covering three generations – none able to break free from their pasts. We encounter the tale of a couple named Emma and Jasper, based on Kraus's parents, moving from the Bronx to rural Connecticut. Then there is the story of Kraus herself, in the guise of protagonist Catt Greene, reckoning with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her addict husband a man named Paul. Finally the story of the murder of one troubled youth by another in a locality largely deserted by forward-thinking policies only a brief drive from the protagonist's home in a remote part of Minnesota.
As a reader fond of polished prose of the sort Kraus herself often avoids, I was captivated by the narrative style of the first section.
Being a reader who appreciates crafted language of the style that the author often disregards, I was won over by the novelistic voice of the opening segment. It exhibits a fresh level of observation that makes room for small details, like the pail that the protagonist as a child frees from the ice at the opening of the book, helped by her adored dad. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she says; "a great plaything", he answers, "the elliptical meanings of words rolling around in their mouths like hard candy". She tells the tale of Emma with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not precisely her dream."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was bound to become frustrated when I hoped this new voice could continue through the novel. Kraus says here that she resents the enjoyment readers like me have derived from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disruption, to the unpolished style she echoes from her inspiration writer Kathy Acker, and the void and recurrence of her previous novels comes back in the second segment. Catt Greene is attempting to do up multiple decrepit residences in the city's most challenging districts while shuttling between two different states, failing to help Paul manage his alcohol use. She experiences powerlessness as her spouse cycles through underfunded jobs as an recovery specialist in a society propelled by the rage and anxiety that underpins an electoral success. Multiple pages are devoted about the protagonist facing cancellation on a platform, her occupation changed from "novelist" to "property owner" on the online encyclopedia. She still gives the impression 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 may grasp something about an the United States that her Twitter detractors would be unable to grasp, would overlook entirely".
The Killing Story
Thus we arrive to the murder itself – and the titular day spent by the victim with the perpetrator and his associates. The author possesses excellent raw material, and knows hour by hour what occurred as Brandon came to see Brittney after meeting her on an app where she offered adult photos. He anticipated intimacy but appears congenially to have passed the day alongside her friends, mooching around getting his car mended and paying for snacks and drugs, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's boyfriend a man named Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has frequently been hospitalised for aggressive outbursts.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
Catt gets obsessed by the narrative, and I was intrigued by the way that her twin drives towards accurate chronicling and daring boundary-pushing clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to explore more thoroughly her individual preoccupations here. The standout figure is Brittney, who comes alive partially because of Catt seeing herself in her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual going off the rails in a troubled, forgotten town. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in jail, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The complete segment feels oddly unfinished, to the extent that her narrative ends almost mid-par
