For example, Dorcas' father was killed in East St. Louis during the riots of 1917. He was pulled from a streetcar and beaten to death. Her mother died that same day when her apartment building was torched by protestors. Morrison notes that Dorcas, just a child at the time, went to "two funerals in five days, and never said a word (Morrison, 57)." When Violet seeks out solstice with Dorcas' aunt Alice, Alice points out to her that she earned the nickname "Violent" for slashing Dorcas' face. Alice said that she never picked up a knife, "Even when my husband ran off I never did that. And you. You didn't even have a worthy enemy. Somebody worth killing. You picked up a knife to insult a dead girl (Morrison, 85)." But after that Alice thinks back to how she felt when her husband abandoned her and how she too wanted...
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