The new book is populated with characters pursuing fresh starts, struggling to escape addictions or harmful partnerships, only to find hope curdling into conflict. Chris Kraus repeatedly invokes the phrase "clean slate", making it intentionally weary through constant reiteration. Phrases such as "He could make a fresh start" and "They opted for a clean break" are scattered across the text. And yet, Kraus herself seems to be making her own fresh start, since this appears a different type of work – observational, authentically narrative. Yet it reveals itself to be filled with the recurring issues and approaches as past novels.
From Accidental Writer to Iconic Work
Chris Kraus began as an artist who became a writer somewhat by chance with her 1997 seminal work I Love Dick, which was composed of letters to an unreceptive lover, converting personal female narrative from humiliation into rebellion. She persisted as a writer, but the following three engaging and challenging novels lacked the impact and rawness that the correspondence format infused into the voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her position as a maverick maker who had turned into a large-scale low-rent landlord, so there was considerable focus on housing investments. It follows that she presently aims to explore new kinds of material, looking outwards to other people's stories, at a period in which she states that Trumpian politics turns intimate literature unnecessary.
Three Generations, Shared Inescapable History
The Four Spent the Day Together is organized into a trio of segments, encompassing three generations – each trapped by their backgrounds. There is the tale of a couple named Emma and Jasper, representations of her own mother and father, moving from the New York borough to rural Connecticut. Then there is the account of Kraus, in the character of protagonist Catt Greene, grappling with the delayed acclaim of I Love Dick, the emergence of Trump, and her substance-dependent spouse a man named Paul. Finally the story of the murder of one lost young man by another in a locality largely deserted by progressive politics only 80 miles from Catt's cottage in rural Minnesota.
For this reader attracted to refined literature of the kind Kraus herself tends to eschew, I was captivated by the narrative style of the first section.
Being a reader drawn to honed writing of the style that Kraus herself often disregards, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the first section. It possesses a fresh level of observation that accommodates trivial aspects, like the container that the young Catt dislodges from ice at the beginning of the narrative, aided by her beloved father. "I found an ice toy!" she says; "a lovely toy", he answers, "the ambiguous meanings of language rolling around in their mouths like piece candy". She tells Emma's story with curiosity and intimacy. "Emma felt like she'd stepped into a dream – not hers, exactly."
Frustration and Disruption
I was bound to become frustrated when I hoped this different style could continue through the novel. The author states here that she resents the enjoyment readers like me have gotten from I Love Dick; she's committed to disjunction, to the untidy aesthetics she has in common with her inspiration author Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her earlier works comes back in the middle section. The protagonist is working on refurbishing multiple decrepit residences in the city's most challenging districts while moving between two different states, failing to help Paul curb his addiction. She feels helpless as Paul transitions between low-resource employment as an substance abuse counselor in a environment propelled by the anger and fear that underpins an electoral success. Multiple pages are devoted about the protagonist facing cancellation on a platform, her listed profession modified from "writer" to "landlord" on the online encyclopedia. She still gives the impression to care a little too much about this. On one occasion she remarks that she's researching the homicide so that before exiting the region, "she might be able to learn something about an the nation that her online critics would be unable to grasp, would not even perceive".
The Killing Story
Then we reach to the actual killing – and the referenced day experienced by the victim with the perpetrator and his friends. The author possesses great source material, and reconstructs step by step what occurred as the victim Brandon came to see Brittney after meeting her on an app where she offered adult photos. He was hoping for sex but seems amiably to have occupied the day with her companions, wandering about fixing his automobile and funding treats and narcotics, before being killed by gunfire by Brittney's partner a man named Micah – a individual with mental health challenges who has frequently been hospitalised for fits of anger.
Fascination and Incompletion
The protagonist becomes fixated by the account, and I found myself captivated by the way that her twin drives towards responsible documentation and reckless transgression wrestle in this part. Yet I wished her to delve deeper into her own obsessions here. The most interesting character is the character Brittney, who comes alive partly through Catt seeing herself in her – yet another intelligent, harassed young woman derailing in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus notes that the protagonist communicates with Brittney in prison, but she omits the dramatization of these talks. The complete segment feels curiously unresolved, to the extent that her narrative ends almost mid-par
