A Look at The Four Spent the Day Together by Chris Kraus – An Iconic Writer Explores Something New

The Four Spent the Day Together features characters pursuing fresh starts, struggling to escape addictions or abusive marriages, only to see hope turn into conflict. Chris Kraus often employs the phrase "clean slate", rendering it deliberately jaded through constant reiteration. Examples include "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They opted for a clean break" recur in the narrative. Meanwhile, the author herself seems to be making her personal new beginning, since this seems a different type of work – observational, truly literary. But then it proves to be packed with the familiar conflicts and aesthetics as earlier books.

From Chance Novelist to Iconic Work

Chris Kraus started out as an visual artist who became a writer unintentionally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, which was composed of epistles to an unresponsive love interest, transforming confessional female writing from humiliation into rebellion. She persisted as a writer, but the next trio of fascinating and rebarbative novels did not possess the impact and rawness that the letter form brought to the tone of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her position as a renegade artist who had turned into a extensive real estate holder, so there was considerable focus on property transactions. It is logical that she now wants to experiment with different types of content, turning outward to the experiences of others, at a moment when she asserts that Trumpian politics makes confessional writing obsolete.

Multiple Generations, One Unescapable Past

The Four Spent the Day Together is structured in three parts, covering several time periods – none able to break free from their backgrounds. There is the story of characters Emma and Jasper, representations of her own mother and father, moving from the Bronx to a pastoral setting. Then there is the narrative of the author, in the character of protagonist Catt Greene, grappling with the late recognition of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her partner struggling with addiction a man named Paul. The third thread involves the story of the murder of one lost young man by another in a community long abandoned by progressive politics only a brief drive from Catt's cottage in a remote part of Minnesota.

From my perspective as a reader attracted to honed writing of the sort the author herself typically rejects, I was enchanted by the narrative style of the initial segment.

As a reader who favors crafted language of the kind that Kraus herself usually avoids, I was seduced by the literary tone of the opening segment. It possesses a new quality of attentiveness that makes room for small details, like the bucket that the protagonist as a child frees from the ice at the start of the story, helped by her cherished parent. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she declares; "a great plaything", he answers, "the ambiguous meanings of language circulating in their speech like sweet treats". Kraus writes Emma's story with interest and closeness. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not entirely her own."

Letdown and Fragmentation

I was fated to feel let down when I hoped this different style could continue through the novel. Kraus says here that she is annoyed by the pleasure audiences such as myself have gotten from I Love Dick; she's committed to disruption, to the unpolished style she shares with her idol Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her past books comes back in the central part. The protagonist is working on refurbishing multiple decrepit residences in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while shuttling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unable to aid her husband manage his alcohol use. She feels helpless as Paul transitions between low-resource employment as an substance abuse counselor in a world propelled by the anger and fear that underpins Trump's victory. There are several pages about Catt being cancelled on Twitter, her occupation changed from "novelist" to "landlord" on a reference site. The author still appears to be overly concerned about this. In a moment she remarks that she's looking into the killing so that before departing the state, "she may grasp something about an the United States that her Twitter detractors would fail to comprehend, would overlook entirely".

The Homicide Account

Thus we arrive to the murder itself – and the eponymous day experienced by the deceased with the murderer and his companions. Kraus utilizes compelling foundational content, and details moment by moment what occurred as Brandon came to visit Brittney after connecting via an application where she sold sex pictures. He anticipated intimacy but seems amiably to have occupied the day alongside her friends, wandering about having his vehicle repaired and paying for snacks and drugs, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's partner a man named Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has often been institutionalized for aggressive outbursts.

Preoccupation and Open Ends

Catt gets obsessed by the story, and I was intrigued by the way that her twin drives towards ethical reporting and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. But I'd have liked her to explore more thoroughly her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is Brittney, who comes alive partially because of the protagonist's connection to her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual derailing in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus notes that Catt converses with Brittney in detention, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The whole section feels strangely incomplete, to the point that the author's storytelling ends almost mid-par