A Look at The Four Spent the Day Together by Chris Kraus – An Iconic Writer Attempts Fresh Territory

The Four Spent the Day Together is populated with individuals pursuing new beginnings, trying to break free from addictions or toxic relationships, only to find hope curdling into conflict. The author frequently uses the phrase "clean slate", rendering it willfully cynical through its repetitions. Examples include "He was ready for a new beginning" and "They chose to begin anew" are scattered across the story. At the same time, the author herself appears to be undertaking her personal new beginning, as this presents as a different type of work – fact-based, authentically narrative. However it reveals itself to be packed with the same dilemmas and aesthetics as earlier books.

From Unplanned Author to Cult Classic

The writer began as an visual artist who entered the literary world almost accidentally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, which was composed of letters to an unreceptive lover, converting confessional female writing from self-debasement into assassination. She persisted as a writer, but the next trio of engaging and challenging novels did not possess the power and directness that the epistolary style infused into the narrative voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her position as a renegade artist who had turned into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was considerable focus on housing investments. It makes sense that she now wants to explore different types of content, looking outwards to external narratives, at a period in which she claims that contemporary political climate renders personal narrative obsolete.

Multiple Generations, Collective Unavoidable Background

The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, encompassing several time periods – none able to break free from their pasts. The book includes the story of characters Emma and Jasper, representations of the author's parents, moving from the New York borough to a pastoral setting. There is the account of Kraus, in the character of protagonist Catt Greene, reckoning with the late recognition of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her addict husband her husband Paul. The third thread involves the narrative of a homicide of one lost young man by another in a community long abandoned by progressive politics only 80 miles from Catt's cottage in the Minnesota countryside.

From my perspective as a reader fond of refined literature of the type Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was seduced by the narrative style of the opening part.

Being a reader who appreciates crafted language of the variety that Kraus herself usually avoids, I was won over by the storytelling approach of the opening segment. There is a novel degree of detail that makes room for minutiae, like the pail that the young Catt pries out of frozen water at the opening of the book, aided by her beloved father. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she exclaims; "a great plaything", he replies, "the elliptical meanings of words rolling around in their mouths like hard candy". She tells Emma's story with inquiry and familiarity. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not entirely her own."

Letdown and Fragmentation

I was bound to become frustrated when I hoped this new voice could last out the book. Kraus says here that she dislikes the enjoyment audiences such as myself have derived from I Love Dick; she's committed to fragmentation, to the unpolished style she echoes from her inspiration Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her past books comes back in the middle section. The protagonist is attempting to do up three dozen dilapidated units in the city's most challenging districts while moving between Minnesota and LA, unsuccessful in assisting her husband control his drinking. She is overwhelmed as Paul transitions between underfunded jobs as an addiction therapist in a environment propelled by the rage and anxiety that powers an electoral success. A significant portion discusses about Catt's social media ostracism on social media, her professional designation altered from "author" to "landlord" on Wikipedia. The author still appears to care a little too much about this. In a moment she says that she's investigating the murder so that before leaving Minnesota, "she might be able to learn something about an America that her social media opponents would be unable to grasp, would not even perceive".

The Murder Narrative

Then we reach to the homicide in question – and the referenced day experienced by the victim with the murderer and his companions. Kraus has compelling foundational content, and knows hour by hour what transpired when a man named Brandon came to visit Brittney after meeting her on an app where she marketed explicit images. He sought a sexual encounter but seems affably to have spent the day alongside her friends, loitering fixing his automobile and covering the cost of food and substances, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's partner Micah – a youth with psychological issues who has frequently been hospitalised for violent rage.

Obsession and Unfinished Business

The protagonist becomes fixated by the story, and I was intrigued by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards responsible documentation and audacious rule-breaking tussle in this section. However, I would have preferred her to explore more thoroughly her personal fixations here. The most interesting character is Brittney herself, who comes alive in part due to Catt's identification with her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman going off the rails in a troubled, forgotten town. Kraus notes that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in jail, but she doesn't dramatise these conversations. This entire part feels strangely incomplete, to the point that her narrative ends almost mid-par