A Look at The Four Spent the Day Together by Chris Kraus – A Renowned Writer Ventures Into New Ground
The new book features characters chasing after fresh starts, attempting to leave behind substance abuse or harmful partnerships, only to find hope curdling into violence. 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 chose to begin anew" appear throughout the narrative. And yet, the author herself is embarking on her own fresh start, since this seems a new kind of book – fact-based, authentically narrative. However it turns out to be packed with the recurring issues and aesthetics as her previous works.
From Accidental Writer to Iconic Work
Kraus was originally an visual artist who transitioned to writing somewhat by chance with her 1997 groundbreaking book I Love Dick, structured as missives to a distant beloved, converting confessional female writing from humiliation into assassination. She persisted as a writer, but the next trio of fascinating and rebarbative novels lacked the shock and immediacy that the letter form brought to the voice of I Love Dick. This was not aided by was her role as a renegade artist who had become a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was considerable focus on real estate deals. It follows that she currently desires to try out fresh narrative sources, directing her gaze to other people's stories, at a moment when she asserts that contemporary political climate renders personal narrative redundant.
Several Eras, Collective Unavoidable Background
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, spanning several time periods – all unable to escape their pasts. There is the tale of characters Emma and Jasper, based on her own mother and father, moving from the Bronx to the Connecticut countryside. There is the story of Kraus herself, in the character of protagonist Catt Greene, reckoning with the belated success of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her substance-dependent spouse Paul. And there is the account of a killing of one lost young man by another in a community mostly forsaken by progressive politics only a short distance from Catt's rural residence in the Minnesota countryside.
For this reader fond of refined literature of the sort Kraus tends to eschew, I was captivated by the literary tone of the initial segment.
As someone who reads who favors precise prose of the style that the author tends to eschew, I was captivated by the storytelling approach of the initial part. It exhibits a novel degree of detail that makes room for minutiae, like the bucket that the young Catt pries out of frozen water at the beginning of the narrative, aided by her cherished parent. "Look, an ice toy!" she declares; "a great plaything", he replies, "the nuanced interpretations of terms circulating in their speech like hard candy". She tells Emma's narrative with curiosity and intimacy. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not precisely her dream."
Frustration and Disruption
I was destined to be disappointed when I hoped this new voice could continue through the novel. Kraus notes here that she dislikes the enjoyment readers like me have taken from I Love Dick; she's devoted to disjunction, to the unpolished style she shares with her hero author Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her earlier works comes back in the middle section. The protagonist is working on refurbishing three dozen dilapidated units in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while moving between two different states, unsuccessful in assisting Paul control his drinking. She experiences powerlessness as her spouse cycles through poorly supported positions as an recovery specialist in a world fueled by the anger and fear that underpins a political win. Multiple pages are devoted about the protagonist facing cancellation on a platform, her listed profession modified from "writer" to "property owner" on the online encyclopedia. She still gives the impression to care a little too much about this. On one occasion she states that she's researching the homicide so that before departing the state, "she may grasp something about an the United States that her social media opponents would not understand, would overlook entirely".
The Killing Story
Thus we arrive to the homicide in question – and the eponymous day experienced by the deceased with the killer and his friends. Kraus utilizes excellent raw material, and knows hour by hour what happened when a man named Brandon came to meet Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she offered adult photos. He anticipated intimacy but appears congenially to have passed the day alongside her friends, loitering fixing his automobile and paying for snacks and drugs, before being murdered by her romantic interest Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has repeatedly received inpatient care for aggressive outbursts.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
The protagonist becomes fixated by the account, and I was fascinated by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards responsible documentation and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to delve deeper into her individual preoccupations here. The most interesting character is the character Brittney, who gains dimension partially because of Catt's identification with her – another bright, bullied girl derailing in a struggling, neglected community. The author informs us that Catt speaks to Brittney in prison, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The whole section feels curiously unresolved, to the point that Kraus's narration ends almost mid-par
