This latest work is populated with individuals chasing after new beginnings, attempting to leave behind substance abuse or abusive marriages, only to see hope turn into aggression. Chris Kraus repeatedly invokes the phrase "fresh start", making it willfully cynical through its repetitions. Phrases such as "He could make a fresh start" and "They opted for a clean break" recur in the text. At the same time, the author herself is embarking on her own fresh start, as this seems a new kind of book – documentarian, genuinely novelistic. However it turns out to be filled with the recurring issues and aesthetics as past novels.
From Accidental Writer to Iconic Work
Chris Kraus started out as an visual artist who became a writer unintentionally with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, made up of missives to a distant beloved, converting confessional female writing from humiliation into rebellion. She persisted as a writer, but the next trio of engaging and challenging novels lacked the impact and rawness that the epistolary style infused into the voice of I Love Dick. Compounding this was her role as a renegade artist who had become a major property owner, so there was much discussion on housing investments. It makes sense that she presently aims to try out fresh narrative sources, directing her gaze to other people's stories, at a time when she states that contemporary political climate turns intimate literature unnecessary.
Three Generations, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, covering several time periods – each trapped by their backgrounds. The book includes the story of characters Emma and Jasper, based on Kraus's parents, relocating from the New York borough to rural Connecticut. Then there is the account of Kraus, in the character of Catt Greene, confronting the late recognition of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her partner struggling with addiction a man named Paul. Finally the account of a killing of one directionless individual by another in a locality mostly forsaken by liberal ideals only 80 miles from Catt's cottage in a remote part of Minnesota.
From my perspective as a reader drawn to honed writing of the kind Kraus often avoids, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the opening part.
Being a reader who favors honed writing of the variety that Kraus herself usually avoids, I was captivated by the literary tone of the first section. It possesses a fresh level of observation that accommodates small details, like the bucket that the protagonist as a child frees from the ice at the start of the story, aided by her cherished parent. "I discovered a frozen plaything!" she says; "a great plaything", he responds, "the ambiguous meanings of language tumbling in their mouths like piece candy". The author narrates the tale of Emma with interest and closeness. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not entirely her own."
Letdown and Fragmentation
I was bound to become frustrated when I expected this different style could persist to the end. Kraus says here that she resents the pleasure audiences such as myself have taken from I Love Dick; she's committed to disruption, to the unpolished style she echoes from her inspiration author Kathy Acker, and the blankness and repetitiveness of her earlier works reasserts itself in the middle section. Catt Greene is attempting to do up multiple decrepit residences in the city's most challenging districts while moving between the Midwest and the West Coast, unable to aid her husband manage his alcohol use. She is overwhelmed as Paul moves between poorly supported positions as an recovery specialist in a environment propelled by the anger and fear that underpins a political win. Multiple pages are devoted about the protagonist facing cancellation on social media, her listed profession modified from "author" to "landlord" on a reference site. Kraus still seems to be overly concerned about this. At one point she states that she's investigating the murder so that before leaving Minnesota, "she might be able to learn something about an the nation that her online critics would not understand, would overlook entirely".
The Homicide Account
So then we come to the murder itself – and the referenced day passed by the murdered individual with the perpetrator and his associates. The author possesses great source material, and details moment by moment what transpired when Brandon came to meet Brittney after encountering her on a platform where she sold sex pictures. He sought a sexual encounter but seems affably to have spent the day with her companions, wandering about getting his car mended and paying for snacks and drugs, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's boyfriend a man named Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has often been institutionalized for fits of anger.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
Catt gets obsessed by the account, and I was intrigued by the way that the author's conflicting impulses towards ethical reporting and audacious rule-breaking wrestle in this part. But I'd have liked her to delve deeper into her own obsessions here. The standout figure is Brittney herself, who gains dimension in part due to Catt's identification with her – another bright, bullied girl going off the rails in a troubled, forgotten town. The author informs us that Catt converses with Brittney in jail, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The whole section feels strangely incomplete, to the degree that her narrative ends almost mid-par
