League 1

Victoria League
Tison Pugh
LIT3482
19 February 2015
Feminist CritiqueView of Ginny Weasley etc etc
In Harry Potter and the Sorcerers Stone and Harry Potter and the
Chamber of Secrets, J. K. Rowling constructs Ginny Weasleys as a feminine
character displaying typical female behavior, placing her firmly in the
gender role of female. Her character has no developed personality, existing
only as a love interest for Harry, and . J. K. Rowling, the author, constructs
her her as a very feminine character displaying typical female behavior,
placing her firmly in the gender role of female.. Ginnys importance in the
second novel builds her as a betrayer, a weakling, and a damsel in distress,
which serves to enforce her gender and her romantic relation to Harry,
instead of furthering her character development.
Ginny Weasley is extremely feminine in the Harry Potter novels.
Elizabeth E. Heilman describes Ginny as the archetypal girl who is deeply
passive, weak, and receptive (230). In the readers first encounter with
Ginny, she starts to cry as the train leaves with her older brothers (The
Sorcerers Stone 97), already starting her characterization as a girlish child.
Crying is typically associated with females, which makes her femininity much
stronger because it is one of her first actions in the series. Ginny continues to
cry throughout the second book; Percy tells Ron that Ginny has been crying
her eyes out and that he has never seen her so upset (The Chamber of

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Secrets 157). Tom Riddle tells Harry that Ginny, upon entering the Chamber
of Secrets, struggled and cried and became very boring (The Chamber of
Secrets 313). When Harry wakes her, she [draws] a great, shuddering gasp
and tears [begin] to pour down her face (The Chamber of Secrets 322), and
Rowling goes on to mention multiple times in the next ten pages that Ginny
is still crying: tears were still flooding silently down Ginnys face (326);
tears were still coursing silently down her cheeks (328). Such persistent
characterization of Ginny as a crying girl indicates that this is an important
action or trait of hers.
In The Chamber of Secrets, Ginny shriek[s] that shed left her diary in
the house as her family tries to leave for the Hogwarts train (66), an action
that readers would expect from a girl because of both the shriek and the
diary. Later she is described as wailing (The Chamber of Secrets 210), a
verb that is not often used to describe boys. When a cat becomes the victim
of the monster in the Chamber of Secrets, Ron tells Harry that Ginny is a
great cat lover (146). Cats tend to be linked with women, and Heilman
notes that doting on cats is effeminate (232); this association is a way to
further feminize Ginny. Once her classmate is attacked, Ginny acts
distraught and one of her brothers says that she has been having
nightmares (The Chamber of Secrets 185). The diary returns near the end of
the novel; the reader learns she has been writing in Tom Riddles diary all
year. Tom Riddle says that she opened her heart and spilled all her secrets
to an invisible stranger, writing about all her pitiful worries and woes (The

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Chamber of Secrets 309). These are actions that readers would expect from
a girl, but not from a boy, further placing Ginny in the limiting box of
female. Riddle, although bored with Ginnys writings, is kind to her and
writes back, leading Ginny to tell him that shes so glad Ive got this diary to
confide in (The Chamber of Secrets 309), a statement typical of a girl.
If Ginny is a typical female, then an important part of her character will
logically be romance. Rowling introduces and Ginny is introduced, and
tthereafter always noted,s Ginny based on her interest in Harry, immediately
defining her based on a male. When we readers first see her in The
Sorcerers Stone, she is beggingbegs to see Harry for herself: Oh, Mom, can
I go on the train and see him, Mom, oh please. (97). Still too young to be
thinking romantically about Harry, shesher curiosity stems from interested
in him because of his fame and reputation. This interest develops into a
romantic attraction by The Chamber of Secrets, where her siblings rescue
Harry from his family and bring him into their home. Upon seeing Harry,
Ginny runs out of the room, presumably from shyness. Ron Weasley says to
Harry that Ginny has been talking about you all summer, and Fred adds,
shell be wanting your autograph, Harry (The Chamber of Secrets 35).
Already Rowling is building Ginnys attraction to Harry and setting the stage
for their future romance. As Harrys stay in Ginnys home continues, he notes
that Ginny is, Ginny seemed very prone to knocking things over whenever
Harry entered a room and continually blushes around him and she
continually blushes in his presence (The Chamber of Secrets 43). All of her

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appearances culminate in a girly reaction to Harry that indicates her
romantic attraction and nothing else about her personality.
At Hogwarts readers hardly see Ginny and when they do, she continues
to act shy and nervous around Harry, continually doing things like carefully
not look[ing] at Harry while in his presence (The Chamber of Secrets 286).
When Harry receives her valentine in front of a line of first years, which
happened to include Ginny Weasley, Draco Malfoy accuses Ginny of sending
it by saying, I dont think Potter liked your valentine much! (The Chamber
of Secrets 237-9). Ginny runs away, embarrassed, leading the reader to
believe that Ginny did indeed send the valentine. Readers do not doubt
Dracos accusation because Rowling has constructed Ginny entirely on her
girly attraction to Harry and this is certainly within the scope of her interest
for him. Draco is not the only one to tease Ginny about her obvious
intentions; Ron, her own brother, proclaims, Youve got competition, Ginny!
when another girl shows interest in Harry (The Chamber of Secrets 326).
Rons comment, said in front of both Ginny and Harry, enforces the readers
conception of Ginny as a lovesick young girl and nothing more.
The first time we hear Ginny speak while Harry is around, she is
defending him from Dracos insults while glaring at Draco: Leave him alone,
he didnt want all that! (The Chamber of Secrets 61). Draco takes this
chance to taunt Harry further, saying, Potter, youve got yourself a
girlfriend! and Ginny turns scarlet (The Chamber of Secrets 61). This is
the first indication of Ginnys personality further than simply shy and

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blushing, but her bravery only appears when defending Harry. This
characterization plays off her attraction and interest in Harry instead of
developing her personality. When Tom Riddle rattles off a paragraph about
the boring things Ginny wrote in his diary, he emphasizes that Ginny did not
think the famous, good, great Harry Potter would ever like her. (The
Chamber of Secrets 309). Her other concerns are what the reader would
expect an eleven-year-old girl to write,unimportant; but as even Riddle could
deduce, her crush on Harry defines her. Otherwise indistinguishable from any
other girl of her age, save for her near-obsession with Harry, Ginny does not
haveRowling does not give Ginny a a personality of her own.
One could argue that Ginnys flat character construction is a logical
result of her status as a minor character; Hermione, a character readers see
very often in the novels, would of course possess a stronger, rounded
personality of her own. However, the fact that Ginnys character creation
completely revolves around Harry, and the fact that all notable personality
traits relate to her feelings for him, indicates that Rowling had no other
purpose for Ginny besides acting as Harrys future love interest.
Heilman explains that Ginnys attraction to Harry disables her instead of
allowing her character to grow (230). Her importance in The Chamber of
Secrets actually actually enforces this, because she is a damsel in distress, a
young girl easily tricked by dark magic and in need of a hero to rescue her.
This familiar trope gives her a stronger romantic tie to Harry instead of

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increasing her importance as a character of her own right, and is problematic
because women should not be defined by, or created for, men.
Ginny Weasley is more feminized than other important female characters,
like Hermione. She displays more typical female behavior. In the readers
first encounter with Ginny, she starts to cry as the train leaves with her older
brothers (The Sorcerers Stone 97), already starting her characterization as a
girlish child. [QUOTE FROM ARTICLE ABOUT GINNY BEING QUINTISSENTIALLY
FEMALE] Crying is typically associated with females, which makes her
female-ness much stronger because its one of the first actions she does in
the books. Ginny continues to cry throughout the second book; Percy tells
Ron that Ginny has been crying her eyes out and that hes never seen her
so upset (The Chamber of Secrets 157). Tom Riddle tells Harry that Ginny,
upon entering the Chamber of Secrets, struggled and cried and became
very boring (The Chamber of Secrets 313). When Harry wakes her, she
[draws] a great, shuddering gasp and tears [begin] to pour down her face
(The Chamber of Secrets 322), and Rowling goes on to mention multiple
times in the next ten pages that Ginny is still crying: tears were still flooding
silently down Ginnys face (326); tears were still coursing silently down her
cheeks (328). Such persistent characterization of Ginny as a crying girl
indicates that this is an important action or trait of hers.
In The Chamber of Secrets, Ginny shriek[s] that shed left her diary in the
house as her family tries to leave for the Hogwarts train (66), an action that
readers would expect from a little girl because of both the shriek and the

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diary. Later she is described as wailing (The Chamber of Secrets 210), a
verb that is not often used to describe boys. When a cat becomes the victim
of the monster in the Chamber of Secrets, Ron tells Harry that Ginny is a
great cat lover (146), and cats tend to be associated with women.[MAYBE
FILCH IN HERE? FAILED MASCULINITY?] Once her classmate is attacked,
Ginny is distraught and one of her brothers says that shes been having
nightmares since the attacks started (The Chamber of Secrets 185). The
diary comes back near the end of the novel; the reader learns shes been
writing in Tom Riddles diary all year. Tom Riddle says that she opened her
heart and spilled all her secrets to an invisible stranger, writing about all
her pitiful worries and woes (The Chamber of Secrets 309). These are
actions that readers would expect from a girl, but not from a boy, further
placing Ginny in the limiting box of female. Riddle, although bored with
Ginnys writings, is kind to her and writes back, leading Ginny to tell him that
shes so glad Ive got this diary to confide in (The Chamber of Secrets 309),
a statement typical of a girl.
Rowling and the other characters consistently treat Ginny as a
little girl, even though she is only a year younger than Harry, Hermione, and
Ron. She is continually characterized as a child throughout the first two
novels. When Ginny notices Harry Potter and squeals his name, Mrs.
Weasley interrupts her and scolds her by saying, Be quiet, Ginny, and its
rude to point (The Sorcerers Stone 308). This diminishes Ginny because
she is treated as though she hasnt been fully raised yet; such a basic

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correction is rarely given to anyone other than a child. In The Chamber of
Secrets, Ginny is a year older but still Rowling describes her as a small, redheaded figure in a long nightdress (35), or a small, black-robed figure
(307), enforcing the readers view that she is a small child. When the
Weasleys enter Diagon Alley to shop for school supplies, Harry notices that
Ginny is just clinging onto Mrs. Weasleys hand (The Chamber of Secrets
56), and later sees Mrs. Weasley take her hand again before leaving a shop
(67). None of the other characters are holding their mothers hand, a
behavior typical of little children, so readers can see quite easily that Ginny
is a little girl. Granted, she is the youngest character readers see in this
section, but in the previous book when other characters had been her age,
none of them were holding Mrs. Weasleys hand. Tom Riddle even
characterizes Ginny the same way, calling her stupid little Ginny (The
Chamber of Secrets 311). This consistent characterization as a little girl
lessens Ginnys intelligence, maturity, and growth. She is unable to display
traits and actions that would round out her personality because shes just a
little girl, regardless of the fact that shes only a year younger than Harry,
Ron, and Hermione, all of whom were quite capable and well-rounded at her
age.
While itsit is true that Ginny has a central role of importance in the
second novel, her importance is only as a weakling tricked by Tom Riddle and
a damsel in distress. Riddle explains to Harry that Ginny was the culprit the
entire year because hedhe had been able to control her from the diary,

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opening the possibility that Ginny is easily tricked, immature, and needy for
pouring her soul into an unknown diary enough to be controlled by it (The
Chamber of Secrets 310). Heilman agrees, saying that Ginny is weak
enough to be fully possessed and used (230). Riddle forces Ginny to write
her own farewell on the wall and come down [to the Chamber of Secrets] to
wait for Harry Potter to come and save her (The Chamber of Secrets 313).
This places Ginny in the position of damsel in distress, waiting for a hero and
not taking her safety into her own hands. This further diminishes her and
flattens her character into quintessentially female. After Harry finds Ginny
and brings her back to safety, fulfilling his role as the hero, Mrs. Weasley
exclaims, You saved her! You saved her! How did you do it? (The Chamber
of Secrets 327). All of the success is due to Harry as the savior, while Ginny
is merely an object to be saved. The relationship between hero and damsel
in distress often leads to romance, which reemphasizes Ginnys attraction to
Harry and foreshadows a future relationship between them. Upon her rescue,
Ginny cantcannot stop crying out of guilt, and this typical female response
reminds the reader thatreader that she is a girl and a child.
As a final insult, Ginnys own father blames her for her actions even
though she is the victim of a trick by the most powerful dark magician wizard
in history. She sobs to him, explaining with fear, Ive b-been writing in [his
diary], and hes been w-writing back all year and her fathers response is,:
Havent I taught you anything? What have I always told you? Never trust
anything that can think for itself if you cant see where it keeps its brain?

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Why didnt you show the diary to me, or your mother? A suspicious object
like that, it was clearly full of Dark Magic (The Chamber of Secrets 329).
Rowlings italics and Mr. Weasleys attitude indicate that he is deeply angry
withat Ginny for allowing herself to be tricked by Riddle, when in reality she
is the victim. Some readers will recognize this as a form of victimblamingvictim blaming, a phenomenon rampant in our society, especially in
situations where women are attacked and others blame the women for
bringing on the attack. For Ginny to be blamed as a victim by her own father
is a deeply troubling act, yet this further solidifies Ginny as a little girl who
would be dumb enough to write in an unknown diary.
Ginny Weasley is certainly an extremely feminized character whose
only character traits revolve around her romantic interest in Harry Potter.
From a feminist viewpoint, this is a disappointing construction of a female
character that could have been well rounded and worthwhile for more than
just a man. However, readers must ask themselves: is it such a bad thing
that Ginny is so very girlish? Is it bad to have archetypal characters that
conform to stereotypes and do not demonstrate the ideal? Perhaps these
archetypal characters should not be banished because they might serve an
important purpose; if all the characters in a novel were what readers wanted
them to be, there would be no variety (Pugh). Another argument could be
that this is Harry Potters story, not Ginny Weasleys story. Just as Hermione
and her intelligence are simply part of Harrys entourage, can readers see
Ginny as merely a part of Harrys development and life? (Nikolajeva 131).

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Can Rowling throw her to the side because this is Harrys story, or does she
deserve to have her own, fully developed character? There is no right
answer, but readers would do well to consider the implications of a character
that fulfills so many degrading female stereotypes and what the story loses
by omitting her growth.

Works CitedCONCLUSION:
is it such a bad thing that she is so entirely GIRL? what can be gained from
such a characterization? what do we lose?
Heilman, Elizabeth E. Blue Wizards and Pink Witches: Representations of
Gender Identity and Power. Harry Potter's World. N.p., n.d. 221-239.
Nikolajeva, Maria. Harry Potter A Return to the Romantic Hero. Harry
Potter's World. N.p., n.d. 125-140.
Pugh, Tison. Harry Potter Class Lecture. 10 February 2015.
Rowling, J. K. Harry Potter and the Sorcerers Stone. Scholastic Inc., New
York: 1997. Print.
-- Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. Scholastic Inc., New York: 1999.
Print.