Violet Gray

A snob who likes bragging and, along with her best friends Lucy and Patty, often teases and torments Charlie Brown.

Violet Gray is a fictional character featured in the long-running syndicated daily and Sunday comic strip Peanuts, created by Charles M. Schulz. Violet first appeared in the February 7, 1951 strip. She was originally a major character, until she was eventually relegated to background and cameo appearances as other female characters became more prominent, with Lucy ultimately taking over most of Violet's character traits. Violet is a snob who likes bragging and, along with her best friends Lucy and Patty, often teases and torments Charlie Brown; however, she is generally softer in this regard than Lucy. She bullies other characters in the strip, particularly "Pig-Pen". In addition to the comic strip, Violet has appeared alongside other Peanuts characters in numerous Peanuts television specials, cinematic movies, theatrical plays, and video games.

Quick Facts

Series: Peanuts
First: February 7, 1951, A Charlie Brown Christmas (television special), A Boy Named Charlie Brown (film)
Last: November 12, 1996 (comic strip; original); November 25, 1997 (comic strip; reprint)
Gender: Female

Lore & Background

Violet first appeared in the February 7, 1951 Peanuts strip, becoming the strip's fifth character after Charlie Brown, Shermy, Patty and Snoopy. Her character changed and developed until the 1960s, when she began to be seen less often than the other major characters, with her appearances eventually reduced to the background and cameos. Her last appearance was in the November 27, 1997 Peanuts strip. Violet's surname (Gray) was mentioned only once, on April 4, 1953. Schulz admitted in a 1988 interview that Violet's pure vindictiveness had made it difficult to give her punch lines, and contrasted her to Lucy: where Violet was purely mean, Lucy had redeeming characteristics of being bluntly honest and to-the-point, and thus Lucy "worked" as a more rounded character where Violet did not.

Reader's Guide

Violet is smart, popular, tomboyish, and somewhat of a snob. She makes her opinions known to everyone, and her haughtiness causes her to often torment other people, whom she views as beneath her. Compared to the apparent middle-class upbringing of the other characters, Violet has an upper-class mentality and she likes to brag about how her father possesses something her friends' fathers don't; it is also implied, however, that Violet's father is often absent from her life, which her peers use against her when she gets too obnoxious.

In the early strips, Violet's appearance included shoulder-length black hair kept in either pigtails, a bun, or, sometimes, a ponytail. Later on, Schulz dropped the braids and kept Violet's hair only in ponytails. Violet also wears front bangs and often wears dresses which are originally depicted as purple; later they were depicted as lime green, as well as black Mary Janes shoes. Violet wears her purple dress in The Peanuts Movie, which is consistent with her name.