The Four Spent the Day Together features characters pursuing new beginnings, trying to break free from substance abuse or abusive marriages, only to find hope curdling into conflict. Chris Kraus often employs the phrase "clean slate", transforming it into deliberately jaded through constant reiteration. Examples include "He could make a fresh start" and "They opted for a clean break" recur in the narrative. Meanwhile, Kraus herself appears to be undertaking her individual reinvention, because this seems a different type of work – fact-based, truly literary. Yet it turns out to be laden with the recurring issues and aesthetics as past novels.
From Accidental Writer to Iconic Work
Kraus began as an visual artist who entered the literary world somewhat by chance with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, made up of letters to an unreceptive lover, elevating confessional female writing from humiliation into assassination. She kept producing books, but the next trio of compelling and abrasive novels lacked the power and directness that the epistolary style infused into the tone of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her position as a nonconformist creator who had become a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was much discussion on housing investments. It follows that she now wants to explore fresh narrative sources, looking outwards to the experiences of others, at a moment when she asserts that contemporary political climate renders personal narrative unnecessary.
Several Eras, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, covering several time periods – none able to break free from their histories. We encounter the narrative about characters Emma and Jasper, representations of the author's parents, relocating from the Bronx to rural Connecticut. Then there is the account of Kraus, in the character of Catt Greene, reckoning with the belated success of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her partner struggling with addiction Paul. And there is the account of a killing of one directionless individual by another in a community largely deserted by liberal ideals only 80 miles from Catt's rural residence in the Minnesota countryside.
From my perspective as a reader drawn to honed writing of the sort Kraus tends to eschew, I was enchanted by the literary tone of the opening part.
As someone who reads who favors honed writing of the style that Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was won over by the storytelling approach of the opening segment. It possesses a fresh level of observation that accommodates small details, like the pail that the protagonist as a child dislodges from ice at the start of the story, aided by her cherished parent. "Look, an ice toy!" she declares; "a nice toy", he responds, "the ambiguous meanings of language circulating in their speech like sweet treats". The author narrates the tale of Emma with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not entirely her own."
Frustration and Disruption
I was destined to be disappointed when I wished this different style could persist to the end. Kraus notes here that she is annoyed by the enjoyment those who appreciate polished prose have gotten from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to disruption, to the messy artistic approach she has in common with her hero Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her past books returns in the second segment. The protagonist is working on refurbishing multiple decrepit residences in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while traveling between two different states, unsuccessful in assisting her husband curb his addiction. She is overwhelmed as her spouse transitions between low-resource employment as an recovery specialist in a environment fueled by the anger and fear that drives a political win. Multiple pages are devoted about Catt being cancelled on social media, her professional designation altered from "author" to "real estate holder" on Wikipedia. Kraus still seems to be overly concerned about this. In a moment she says that she's looking into the killing so that before leaving Minnesota, "she may grasp something about an America that her social media opponents would fail to comprehend, would not even perceive".
The Homicide Account
Then we reach to the actual killing – and the titular day experienced by the murdered individual with the killer and his associates. Kraus has great source material, and details moment by moment what transpired when a man named Brandon came to meet Brittney after meeting her on an app where she sold sex pictures. He anticipated intimacy but appears congenially to have passed the day in the company of her associates, mooching around having his vehicle repaired and paying for snacks and drugs, before being killed by gunfire by her romantic interest a man named Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has frequently been hospitalised for fits of anger.
Preoccupation and Open Ends
The protagonist becomes fixated by the account, and I was fascinated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards responsible documentation and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. But I'd have liked her to delve deeper into her personal fixations here. The standout figure is the character Brittney, who gains dimension partly through Catt's identification with her – another bright, bullied girl derailing in a difficult, overlooked locality. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in prison, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. This entire part feels curiously unresolved, to the degree that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par
