History Literature / InTheRealmsOfTheUnreal

This work and Darger's life story have inspired many songs (there's a band called Vivian Girls), comic book characters, mystery novels like Creator/ElizabethHand's ''Curious Toys'' and an RPG called ''[[https://archive.org/details/FryWarStormTLPEbook/mode/1up War Storm]]''.

You may read selections from ''The Story of the Vivian Girls in the Realms of the Unreal'', and the entire ''The Vivian Girls in Chicago'', Henry's weather journal and ''The History of My Life'' [[http://www.idaillinois.org/digital/collection/intuit/search/ the Illinois State Library website]]. (Takes forever to download, be patient.)

A novel [[WatchItForTheMeme known primarily]] for its [[{{Doorstopper}} length]], its [[http://nliventech.net/downloads/ebooks/rawvision_december/chapter2.html illustrations]] [[note]]99% benign and enchanting, 1% NightmareFuel[[/note]], and its writing process[[labelnote:*]]in tiny, tiny handwriting over decades, then neatly typed and bound into massive handmade books[[/labelnote]], Creator/HenryDarger's ''[[LongTitle The Story of the Vivian Girls, in What is known as the Realms of the Unreal, of the Glandeco-Angelinian War Storm, Caused by the Child Slave Rebellion]]'' tells the story of a fictional war between the Christian nation of Angelinia and the militantly atheist nation of Glandelinia. The Vivian Girls are the seven daughters of Robert Vivian, emperor of the Catholic kingdom Abbieannia. The girls are both leaders and inspirational, saint-like figures rallying the troops.

* BigBad: Glandelinian General [[AwesomeMcCoolname John Manly.]]
* BraidsOfAction: Gertrude Aronburg and Celestine Vivian.
* BloodSplatteredInnocents

--> '''General Vivian:''' This is all on account of Darger and his old picture. How is it that the loss of a photograph is responsible for the situation of this war?
--> '''General Darger:''' That is a mystery, your Excellency, even to me.

* WiseBeyondTheirYears: The Vivians and the Aronburg girls.

* LittleMissBadass: Millions of them.

* NoCelebritiesWereHarmed: John Manly's appearance was modeled after Tsar Nicholas II, a contemporary to Henry Darger, which is an perplexing artistic choice for an atheist antagonist considering Nicholas was an Orthodox Christian monarch in opposition to communists, and extremely fond of children.

* HeroicBSOD: Emperor Robert Vivian, ruler of Abbieannia and father of the Vivian Girls, ''at the beginning of the story.'' His youngest girls have disappeared after a violent storm, and he fears not only that they have been lost, but that the storm portends terrible calamities in the near future. (They're not: It does.)

* PlotTriggeringDeath: Annie Aronburg, [[LittleMissBadass aged five]]. The original revolt of the child slaves was her idea, and she was elected their leader. She was coming back from a secret meeting when she was murdered by her captors. She thus became their [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Brown_%28abolitionist%29 John Brown]] figure as well as their UsefulNotes/JoanOfArc. Annie herself was modeled, rather incongruously, on little [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elsie_Paroubek Elsie Paroubek]].

The subject of [[http://www.newyorkerfilms.com/In-The-Realms-of-The-Unreal-(2004)/1/162/ this]] Documentary, which also goes into Darger's life.

* NoCelebritiesWereHarmed: John Manly was modeled after Tsar Nicholas II, a contemporary to Henry Darger, which is an perplexing artistic choice for an atheist antagonist considering Nicholas was an Orthodox Christian monarch in opposition to communists.

* BarbieDollAnatomy:The child characters are often drawn in the nude. At times this trope is played straight, and at other times averted - however the female children are drawn with male anatomy, for reasons that to this day remain unclear. Since it is assumed that Darger remained celibate his entire life, some historians have theorized that he simply [[InnocentInaccurate did not know what female sex organs looked like, or that theirs were different from the males.]]

* PublicDomainStories: Henry never filed a copyright claim for the story during his lifetime; leading his art and writings to fall under this.