The Four Spent the Day Together features protagonists seeking new beginnings, attempting to leave behind substance abuse or abusive marriages, only to find hope curdling into conflict. Chris Kraus often employs the phrase "fresh start", transforming it into deliberately jaded through recurring use. Phrases such as "He could make a fresh start" and "They opted for a clean break" are scattered across the text. And yet, the author herself is embarking on her own fresh start, since this appears a new kind of book – documentarian, genuinely novelistic. However it reveals itself to be packed with the recurring issues and styles as her previous works.
From Accidental Writer to Cult Classic
The writer was originally an artist who entered the literary world almost accidentally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, structured as letters to an unreceptive lover, transforming personal female narrative from humiliation into defiance. She kept producing books, but the three subsequent compelling and abrasive novels did not possess the shock and immediacy that the correspondence format imparted to the tone of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her role as a renegade artist who had turned into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was considerable focus on property transactions. It is logical that she currently desires to experiment with new kinds of material, turning outward to the experiences of others, at a moment when she claims that contemporary political climate turns intimate literature obsolete.
Several Eras, Collective Unavoidable Background
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, covering several time periods – all unable to escape their pasts. There is the narrative about characters Emma and Jasper, based on the author's parents, relocating from the New York borough to a pastoral setting. Additionally the narrative of the author, in the character of protagonist Catt Greene, reckoning with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her partner struggling with addiction Paul. And there is the account of a killing of one directionless individual by another in a locality long abandoned by liberal ideals only a brief drive from the protagonist's home in a remote part of Minnesota.
For this reader attracted to refined literature of the kind the author herself tends to eschew, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the first section.
As someone who reads drawn to precise prose of the variety that the author often disregards, I was seduced by the literary tone of the initial part. It possesses a novel degree of detail that makes room for trivial aspects, like the pail that the young Catt dislodges from ice at the start of the story, assisted by her beloved father. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she says; "a great plaything", he answers, "the ambiguous meanings of language rolling around in their mouths like sweet treats". She tells Emma's story with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not hers, exactly."
Frustration and Disruption
I was destined to be disappointed when I expected this different style could last out the book. Kraus says here that she dislikes the pleasure readers like me have taken from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disruption, to the untidy aesthetics she has in common with her hero Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her earlier works reasserts itself in the second segment. Catt is trying to renovate three dozen dilapidated units in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while shuttling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unable to aid Paul curb his addiction. She experiences powerlessness as Paul transitions between poorly supported positions as an substance abuse counselor in a world fueled by the hostility and dread that powers Trump's victory. There are several pages about Catt's social media ostracism on social media, her listed profession modified from "novelist" to "real estate holder" on a reference site. She still gives the impression to be overly concerned about this. At one point she says that she's researching the homicide so that before exiting the region, "she may grasp something about an America that her Twitter detractors would be unable to grasp, would overlook entirely".
The Killing Story
Thus we arrive to the murder itself – and the eponymous day passed by the deceased with the murderer and his associates. The author possesses compelling foundational content, and reconstructs step by step what occurred as a man named Brandon came to visit Brittney after meeting her on an app where she marketed explicit images. He anticipated intimacy but seems affably to have spent the day with her companions, wandering about getting his car mended and paying for snacks and drugs, before being shot by her romantic interest Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has repeatedly received inpatient care for violent rage.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
The protagonist becomes fixated 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 explore more thoroughly her personal fixations here. The standout figure is Brittney, who gains dimension in part due to Catt's identification with her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus tells us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in jail, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The whole section feels oddly unfinished, to the degree that her narrative ends almost mid-par
