This latest work features protagonists chasing after fresh starts, attempting to leave behind substance abuse or harmful partnerships, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. Kraus frequently uses the phrase "clean slate", making it intentionally weary through recurring use. Sentences like "He could make a fresh start" and "They opted for a clean break" are scattered across the narrative. Meanwhile, the author herself seems to be making her individual reinvention, as this seems a novel form of writing – observational, authentically narrative. However it proves to be laden with the recurring issues and aesthetics as her previous works.
From Chance Novelist to Cult Classic
Chris Kraus was originally an artist who transitioned to writing unintentionally with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, made up of letters to an unreceptive lover, converting intimate women's literature from self-debasement into defiance. She persisted as a writer, but the following three compelling and abrasive novels did not possess the impact and rawness that the letter form imparted to the voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her role as a renegade artist who had evolved into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was significant attention on real estate deals. It follows that she currently desires to explore fresh narrative sources, directing her gaze to other people's stories, at a period in which she claims that Trumpian politics turns intimate literature redundant.
Multiple Generations, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, spanning three generations – each trapped by their histories. We encounter the story of Emma and Jasper, versions of her own mother and father, transitioning from the New York borough to the Connecticut countryside. There is the narrative of the author, in the guise of Catt Greene, confronting the late recognition of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her partner struggling with addiction Paul. And there is the narrative of a homicide of one lost young man by another in a community long abandoned by forward-thinking policies only 80 miles from the protagonist's home in a remote part of Minnesota.
For this reader drawn to polished prose of the sort Kraus often avoids, I was seduced by the literary tone of the opening part.
As someone who reads drawn to precise prose of the kind that Kraus usually avoids, I was seduced by the storytelling approach of the opening segment. It exhibits a fresh level of observation that makes room for minutiae, like the container that the young Catt frees from the ice at the beginning of the narrative, helped by her beloved father. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she says; "a great plaything", he replies, "the nuanced interpretations of terms circulating in their speech like piece candy". The author narrates the tale of Emma with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not precisely her dream."
Frustration and Disruption
I was bound to become frustrated when I expected this fresh tone could persist to the end. The author states here that she dislikes the enjoyment those who appreciate polished prose have derived from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disjunction, to the untidy aesthetics she echoes from her inspiration author Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her previous novels returns in the middle section. Catt is attempting to do up 36 run-down apartments in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while shuttling between the Midwest and the West Coast, unable to aid Paul control his drinking. She experiences powerlessness as her spouse moves between underfunded jobs as an addiction therapist in a environment fueled by the hostility and dread that underpins a political win. Multiple pages are devoted about the protagonist facing cancellation on social media, her occupation changed from "author" to "real estate holder" on the online encyclopedia. The author still appears to invest excessive emotion about this. In a moment she states that she's looking into the killing so that before departing the state, "she may grasp something about an the United States that her social media opponents would be unable to grasp, would not even see".
The Murder Narrative
So then we come to the murder itself – and the eponymous day experienced by the murdered individual with the killer and his companions. Kraus utilizes excellent raw material, and knows hour by hour what transpired when the victim Brandon came to meet Brittney after connecting via an application where she sold sex pictures. He was hoping for sex but seems amiably to have occupied the day in the company of her associates, mooching around having his vehicle repaired and paying for snacks and drugs, before being murdered by Brittney's boyfriend Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has frequently been hospitalised for aggressive outbursts.
Fascination and Incompletion
Catt develops an obsession 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. However, I would have preferred her to explore more thoroughly her individual preoccupations here. The most interesting character is Brittney, who comes alive in part due to Catt's identification with her – another bright, bullied girl spiraling out of control in a troubled, forgotten town. The author informs us that Catt speaks to Brittney in jail, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The complete segment feels oddly unfinished, to the point that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
