The Four Spent the Day Together features characters chasing after clean slates, struggling to escape drugs or toxic relationships, only to witness hope devolve into conflict. Chris Kraus often employs the phrase "new beginning", rendering it willfully cynical through constant reiteration. Sentences like "He aimed to start over" and "They decided to make a fresh start" recur in the text. And yet, she is embarking on her own fresh start, as this appears a different type of work – observational, authentically narrative. But then it turns out to be laden with the recurring issues and styles as earlier books.
From Chance Novelist to Renowned Book
The writer was originally an visual artist who became a writer almost accidentally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, which was composed of letters to an unreceptive lover, elevating confessional female writing from humiliation into rebellion. She kept producing books, but the three subsequent fascinating and rebarbative novels lacked the impact and rawness that the correspondence format imparted to the narrative voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her role as a nonconformist creator who had turned into a major property owner, so there was considerable focus on real estate deals. It follows that she now wants to try out different types of content, turning outward to the experiences of others, at a time when she states that contemporary political climate makes confessional writing redundant.
Several Eras, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, encompassing three generations – each trapped by their pasts. The book includes the tale of characters Emma and Jasper, based on the author's parents, transitioning from the New York borough to the Connecticut countryside. Then there is the narrative of the author, in the character of Catt Greene, confronting the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse Paul. And there is the narrative of a homicide of one troubled youth by another in a town largely deserted by progressive politics only a short distance from Catt's rural residence in a remote part of Minnesota.
From my perspective as a reader fond of polished prose of the sort Kraus tends to eschew, I was enchanted by the literary tone of the first section.
As someone who reads who appreciates crafted language of the kind that Kraus herself usually avoids, I was captivated by the novelistic voice of the initial part. It possesses a novel degree of detail that makes room for small details, like the container that the protagonist as a child frees from the ice at the start of the story, aided by her adored dad. "I found an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a great plaything", he answers, "the elliptical meanings of words circulating in their speech like piece candy". The author narrates Emma's narrative with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not precisely her dream."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was bound to become frustrated when I expected this different style could last out the book. Kraus notes here that she is annoyed by the satisfaction audiences such as myself have taken from I Love Dick; she's committed to disruption, to the messy artistic approach she has in common with her idol writer Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her past books reasserts itself in the second segment. Catt is working on refurbishing 36 run-down apartments in the city's most challenging districts while moving between two different states, failing to help Paul manage his alcohol use. She experiences powerlessness as Paul transitions between poorly supported positions as an recovery specialist in a society propelled by the rage and anxiety that drives Trump's victory. A significant portion discusses about Catt's social media ostracism on Twitter, her listed profession modified from "novelist" to "property owner" on a reference site. She still gives the impression to be overly concerned about this. At one point she remarks that she's researching the homicide so that before leaving Minnesota, "she might be able to learn something about an the nation that her online critics would not understand, would not even perceive".
The Homicide Account
So then we come to the actual killing – and the titular day experienced by the murdered individual with the murderer and his associates. Kraus utilizes great source material, and reconstructs step by step what transpired when Brandon came to see Brittney after meeting her on an app where she offered adult photos. He anticipated intimacy but seems amiably to have occupied the day alongside her friends, mooching around fixing his automobile and paying for snacks and drugs, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has often been institutionalized for aggressive outbursts.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
Catt gets obsessed by the account, and I was intrigued by the way that her twin drives towards ethical reporting and audacious rule-breaking tussle in this section. But I'd have liked her to explore more thoroughly her personal fixations here. The most interesting character is Brittney herself, who gains dimension in part due to Catt's identification with her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman going off the rails in a troubled, forgotten town. The author informs us that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in jail, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The complete segment feels strangely incomplete, to the point that her narrative ends almost mid-par
