Zenia's "Monstrous" Diary

1885, July 20th,

It truly makes me inconsolably miserable to see how the PRB are still objectifying us muses; if any men were to be forthcoming, I would think it to be the PRB. These painters do not care for us as once we show even the faintest potentials of being superior to them, they lock us out.

We are nothing but beautiful, empty vessels for their art.

He enticed me with compliments and sweet nothings:

“Your beauty is other-worldly, madam, a goddess among us mere mortals,”

My heart was full of light for want of love and purpose,

Yet he used that fire to light his own candle, and I was left a dark chasm.

I became his Venus, my body his alone,

He bit my forbidden fruit despite his having a wife of his own,

He must be punished for finding adultery so alluringly sweet,

Alas, I cannot stop him, he holds too much power.

I am no longer ethereal in his paintings, he has stripped me of my godliness,

And he has made me a spectacle for their eyes, a dangerous woman on display,

A puppet dancing for the audience, their eyes burn through my skin,

I have become afraid of this unearthly guise that once gave me assurance.

“Venus was too bold, too flirtatious, so I remade her,”

O! he is a goddess-killer - a true traitor.

The PRB have repressed strong females from the beginning, and I remember the realisation striking me as I watched Lizzie pose as John’s Ophelia. The beauty of that painting still haunts me; how could a woman on the verge of death be so captivating? For men, beauty comes from the destruction of a dangerous woman - “a man must be by your side, or this will happen to you” - an oppressive warning to all women.

---

1888, January 1st,

I am blessed, or perhaps cursed, in knowing the true intentions of the painters: they are dismembering us with their eyes as we obediently allow them to make us into an object of Man’s pleasure. I cannot stand for this treatment any longer, so I have been developing my other-worldliness, the thing they have always told me I possess.

If only I had believed them sooner.

At long last, my plans have come to fruition,

My entire life, within me someone else was hidden,

I now have the strength to release her, I am free, no longer a ghost.

I have transformed into what they love and fear most.

I have learnt the mystical craft of potion making,

I have harnessed the art of alchemy,

I have sacrificed myself; my bones and spirit are beyond breaking,

Like the beautiful Ayesha, I fear not mortality.

I prayed every night to the divine goddess Lilith

To bestow upon me the powers so Man can be overthrown,

She did not disappoint, she has filled me with

The strength to carry on, for I am no longer alone.

“What is that creature about your body?”

*Hiss* - “He’ll help us get into some folly.”

---

1888, January 26th,

For many nights I have been figuring the perfect punishment for the PRB, and I have decided to take a leaf from their book. They trap us muses in the moment of our posing, the exact instance where their gaze immortalises that false perfectness for eternity. So, I thought:

“How fitting it would be for them to be ensnared in a painting, just like us.”

Cobalt blue, madder red, emerald green,

These are the colours of my watercolour world,

The perfect place to secretly convene,

Where our two essences can become twirled.

You cannot be blamed, for you were tempted by my Lilith beauty,

Or perhaps it was the snakes about me that caught your eye,

A somewhat morbid curiosity has led you to this righteous tragedy,

Man must always fall, femme fatales ensure that they comply.

Medusa also started turning men into art,

She took the gaze of Man and replaced it with her own,

And you will meet a similar fate, now it is this knowledge I impart,

That you will be entrapped within my painting, you must atone.

“It says a great deal about you, painter,

That you followed a monster and embraced her.”

With this act of justice, the PRB will know the brutality of the gaze and I will become the painter, not the painted. Most importantly, my fellow muses will be free from the grasps of men who purposefully oppress them.

---

1889, February 4th,

The muses are starting to suspect that I am behind the painters "vanishing" as I have heard them describe it, as if it were some mere trickster magicking the painters away. I will never tell them about my powers, not now while they despise me.

Apparently, I have stolen their husbands.

My sisters, you believe me to be more monstrous

Than the wretched men I have saved you from.

The Brotherhood has constantly feared us and our abilities,

For we are the New Woman, and are not to be taken for fools, like some.

I am no vampire, I do not want your men,

I want you to be your own subject matter, relight the life that they extinguished;

You are not victims anymore, and I have made that possible,

Yet you still see me as a threat and not an ally.

I know that you will never love me again, not while you still suspect me,

So I will leave, and perhaps in my absence you will realise

That in my wounding you, I enabled you to heal your broken souls,

Allowed you to be free of the painters, and nurture yourselves.

“What shall I do now - perhaps I shall travel the world, visit Asia,

Explore the jungles of Africa; I have heard many a great thing about Canada.”