This latest work is populated with individuals seeking clean slates, trying to break free from addictions or toxic relationships, only to witness hope devolve into aggression. Kraus repeatedly invokes the phrase "clean slate", making it willfully cynical through its repetitions. Sentences like "He could make a fresh start" and "They opted for a clean break" appear throughout the text. And yet, Kraus herself is embarking on her own fresh start, since this presents as a new kind of book – documentarian, truly literary. Yet it reveals itself to be laden with the familiar conflicts and styles as past novels.
From Chance Novelist to Iconic Work
Chris Kraus started out as an visual artist who became a writer somewhat by chance with her 1997 cult classic I Love Dick, structured as letters to an unreceptive lover, transforming confessional female writing from abjection into assassination. She kept producing books, but the three subsequent compelling and abrasive novels missed the shock and immediacy that the letter form brought to the voice of I Love Dick. It didn't help was her identity as a nonconformist creator who had become a major property owner, so there was much discussion on real estate deals. It follows that she now wants to try out different types of content, looking outwards to external narratives, at a moment when she claims that Trumpian politics makes confessional writing unnecessary.
Three Generations, One Unescapable Past
The Four Spent the Day Together is divided into three sections, covering three generations – none able to break free from their histories. We encounter the tale of characters Emma and Jasper, representations of the author's parents, relocating from the Bronx to rural Connecticut. Then there is the narrative of the author, in the character of Catt Greene, grappling with the late recognition of I Love Dick, the ascent of a political figure, and her partner struggling with addiction Paul. Finally the account of a killing of one troubled youth by another in a locality mostly forsaken by progressive politics only a short distance from the protagonist's home in the Minnesota countryside.
As a reader attracted to polished prose of the type Kraus herself often avoids, I was captivated by the narrative style of the initial segment.
As someone who reads drawn to precise prose of the style that the author often disregards, I was seduced by the novelistic voice of the initial part. It exhibits a fresh level of observation that accommodates small details, like the container that the protagonist as a child pries out of frozen water at the start of the story, helped by her adored dad. "Look, an ice toy!" she exclaims; "a nice toy", he answers, "the elliptical meanings of words circulating in their speech like hard candy". Kraus writes Emma's narrative with inquiry and familiarity. "It seemed to Emma she had entered a dream – not precisely her dream."
Disappointment and Disjunction
I was bound to become frustrated when I hoped this fresh tone could continue through the novel. Kraus notes here that she is annoyed by the satisfaction audiences such as myself have gotten from I Love Dick; she's dedicated to fragmentation, to the messy artistic approach she has in common with her idol Kathy Acker, and the emptiness and redundancy of her earlier works comes back in the central part. Catt Greene is attempting to do up three dozen dilapidated units in the most troubled areas of Albuquerque while shuttling between Minnesota and LA, failing to help Paul control his drinking. She experiences powerlessness as her spouse moves between low-resource employment as an recovery specialist in a environment fueled by the rage and anxiety that powers a political win. A significant portion discusses about the protagonist facing cancellation on social media, her listed profession modified from "novelist" to "landlord" on a reference site. The author still appears to care a little too much about this. On one occasion she remarks that she's looking into the killing so that before leaving Minnesota, "she may grasp something about an the nation that her Twitter detractors would not understand, would not even see".
The Murder Narrative
Then we reach to the actual killing – and the referenced day spent by the deceased with the perpetrator and his friends. The author possesses great source material, and details moment by moment what happened when a man named Brandon came to visit Brittney after meeting her on an app where she offered adult photos. He anticipated intimacy but appears congenially to have passed the day with her companions, mooching around getting his car mended and covering the cost of food and substances, before being murdered by her romantic interest a man named Micah – a young, mentally ill man who has often been institutionalized for aggressive outbursts.
Obsession and Unfinished Business
Catt develops an obsession by the account, and I found myself captivated by the way that her twin drives towards accurate chronicling and audacious rule-breaking clash in this segment. Yet I wished her to go further into her own obsessions here. The standout figure is the character Brittney, who comes alive partly through Catt's identification with her – another bright, bullied girl spiraling out of control in a difficult, overlooked locality. Kraus notes that Catt speaks to Brittney in jail, but she fails to enact these dialogues. The complete segment feels curiously unresolved, to the point that her narrative ends almost mid-par
