Henry Darger wrote 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 sometime between 1910 to 1912 and 1938 to 1939. This saga is embellished by borrowings from historic newspaper accounts of the Civil War and World War I, Catholic liturgy, sacred hymns, and classical and popular literature, such as Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe, The Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll, and L. Frank Baum’s series of Oz books. Darger’s art practice is seen as an extension of his writing instead of being an illustration of it. He created a cast of charismatic characters to provide the support structure for his narrative, which is composed of long-winded descriptions of battle scenes and cataclysms brought about by thunderstorms, forest fires, typhoons, and floods. Colonel Jack Francis Evans, surrounded in this work by a capitalized description (typical of the artist), is the guardian of the seven intrepid Vivian sisters: Violet Mary, Jennie Francis, Joice Catherine, Evangeline Celestine, Catherine Cecilia, Hettie Annie, and Daisy Gertrude.

Valérie Rousseau, exhibition label for Six Decades Collecting Self-Taught Art: Revealing a Diverse and Rich Artistic Narrative. New York: American Folk Art Museum, 2019.