The new book centers on protagonists chasing after new beginnings, trying to break free from addictions or harmful partnerships, only to witness hope devolve into conflict. Chris Kraus often employs the phrase "new beginning", making it intentionally weary through constant reiteration. Sentences like "He could make a fresh start" and "They opted for a clean break" appear throughout the narrative. And yet, Kraus herself is embarking on her individual reinvention, because this presents as a different type of work – documentarian, authentically narrative. But then it turns out to be laden with the familiar conflicts and styles as past novels.
From Accidental Writer to Renowned Book
Chris Kraus began as an artist who transitioned to writing almost accidentally with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, structured as epistles to an unresponsive love interest, elevating confessional female writing from abjection into rebellion. She continued writing, but the following three compelling and abrasive novels did not possess the shock and immediacy that the epistolary style brought to the voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her position as a renegade artist who had become a major property owner, so there was much discussion on property transactions. It is logical that she now wants to explore different types of content, turning outward to external narratives, at a period in which she claims that Trumpian politics turns intimate literature 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 backgrounds. The book includes the story of Emma and Jasper, based on the author's parents, transitioning from the urban environment to rural Connecticut. Then there is the narrative of the author, in the guise of protagonist Catt Greene, confronting the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the rise of Trump, and her addict husband a man named Paul. And there is the story of the murder of one troubled youth by another in a town long abandoned by forward-thinking policies only a brief drive from Catt's cottage in rural Minnesota.
For this reader fond of refined literature of the sort Kraus herself typically rejects, I was captivated by the narrative style of the opening part.
As someone who reads who favors precise prose of the variety that Kraus often disregards, I was seduced by the storytelling approach of the initial part. It exhibits a new quality of attentiveness that accommodates small details, like the container that the young Catt dislodges from ice at the beginning of the narrative, assisted by her beloved father. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she declares; "a great plaything", he responds, "the ambiguous meanings of language tumbling in their mouths like hard candy". She tells Emma's narrative with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma experienced a dreamlike sensation – not entirely her own."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was bound to become frustrated when I expected this fresh tone could persist to the end. The author states here that she is annoyed by the enjoyment audiences such as myself have derived from I Love Dick; she's committed to disjunction, to the messy artistic approach she has in common with her hero writer Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her earlier works comes back in the middle section. Catt is attempting to do up three dozen dilapidated units in Albuquerque's worst neighbourhoods while shuttling between two different states, unsuccessful in assisting Paul manage his alcohol use. She is overwhelmed as her spouse cycles through poorly supported positions as an substance abuse counselor in a society driven by the hostility and dread that underpins an electoral success. There are several pages about Catt's social media ostracism on Twitter, her listed profession modified from "author" to "property owner" on a reference site. She still gives the impression to invest excessive emotion about this. On one occasion she states that she's looking into the killing so that before departing the state, "she could potentially understand something about an the nation that her Twitter detractors would not understand, would overlook entirely".
The Killing Story
Thus we arrive to the actual killing – and the referenced day spent by the victim with the murderer and his companions. Kraus has excellent raw material, and reconstructs step by step what happened when Brandon came to visit Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she offered adult photos. He was hoping for sex but appears congenially to have passed the day alongside her friends, loitering getting his car mended and paying for snacks and drugs, before being shot by Brittney's partner a man named Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has repeatedly received inpatient care for fits of anger.
Fascination and Incompletion
Catt develops an obsession by the account, and I found myself captivated by the way that Kraus's dual urges towards accurate chronicling and audacious rule-breaking tussle in this section. But I'd have liked her to go further into her individual preoccupations here. The standout figure is the character Brittney, who gains dimension partly through the protagonist's connection to her – a similarly gifted, tormented individual going off the rails in a troubled, forgotten town. The author informs us that Catt speaks to Brittney in jail, but she fails to enact these dialogues. This entire part feels curiously unresolved, to the degree that her narrative ends almost mid-par
