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Victoria League

Tison Pugh

LIT3482

19 February 2015

Feminist View of Ginny Weasley

In Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone and Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets,

J. K. Rowling constructs Ginny Weasley 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 her importance in the second novel

builds her as a weakling and a damsel in distress. This 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, which readers see most

strongly in Ginny’s persistent crying. In the reader’s first encounter with Ginny, she starts to cry

as the train leaves with her older brothers (The Sorcerer’s 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, one of her brothers, tells sibling Ron that Ginny has been

“crying her eyes out” and that he has “never seen her so upset” (The Chamber of Secrets 157).

Tom Riddle, the novel’s villain, 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 from a magic-induced slumber, she “[draws] a great, shuddering gasp and tears [begin] to

pour down her face” (The Chamber of Secrets 322). Rowling goes on to mention multiple times

in the next ten pages that Ginny is still crying: “tears were still flooding silently down Ginny’s

face” (326); “tears were still coursing silently down her cheeks” (328). Such persistent

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characterization of Ginny as a crying girl feminizes her and indicates that this is an important

action or trait of hers.

Elizabeth E. Heilman describes Ginny as “the archetypal girl” who is “deeply passive,

weak, and receptive” (230). Ginny displays other feminine behavior aside from crying. In The

Chamber of Secrets, Ginny “shriek[s] that she’d 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 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 further feminizes 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

Riddle’s 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 Ginny’s writings, kindly

writes back, leading Ginny to tell him that she’s “so glad I’ve got this diary to confide in” (The

Chamber of Secrets 309), a girlish statement.

As a typical female, an important part of Ginny’s character is romance. Rowling

introduces and thereafter always notes Ginny based on her interest in Harry, immediately

defining her based on a male. When readers first see her in The Sorcerer’s Stone, she begs to see

Harry for herself: “Oh, Mom, can I go on the train and see him, Mom, oh please….” (97). Still

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too young to be thinking romantically about Harry, her curiosity interest stems from 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 in

her home, 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, “she’ll be wanting your

autograph, Harry” (The Chamber of Secrets 35). Already Rowling is buildinghas built Ginny’s

attraction to Harry and setting the stage for their future romance. As Harry’s stay in Ginny’s

home continues, he notes that Ginny seemsis “very prone to knocking things over” and

continually blushes around him (The Chamber of Secrets 43). All of her 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 don’t 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 Draco’s 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, “You’ve got competition, Ginny!” when another girl shows interest in Harry

(The Chamber of Secrets 326). Ron’s comment, said in front of both Ginny and Harry, enforces

the reader’s conception of Ginny as a lovesick young girl and nothing more.

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The first time we hear Ginny speak while Harry is around, she is defending him from

Draco’s insults while glaring at Draco: “Leave him alone, he didn’t want all that!” (The

Chamber of Secrets 61). Draco takes this chance to taunt Harry further, saying, “Potter, you’ve

got yourself a girlfriend!” and Ginny turns “scarlet” (The Chamber of Secrets 61). This is the

first indication of Ginny’s personality further than simply shy and 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 unimportant; 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 have a personality of her own.

One could argue that Ginny’s flat character construction is a logicalresults result logically

from 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. However, the fact that Ginny’s

character creation completely revolves around Harry, and the fact that all notable personality

traits relate to her feelings for him, indicate that Rowling had no other purpose for Ginny besides

acting as Harry’s future love interest. aside from romance for Harry. Elizabeth Heilman explains

that Ginny’s attraction to Harry “disables her” instead of allowing her character to grow (230).

Her importance in The Chamber of Secrets actually enforces this, because she isbecomes a

damsel in distress, a young girl easily tricked by dark magic, and and in needs of a hero to rescue

her. This familiar trope gives her a stronger romantic tie to Harry instead of increasing her

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importance as a character of her own right, and is problematic because women should not be

defined by, or created for, men.

While it is true that Ginny has a central role 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 he had been able to control her from the diary,

opening giving the possibility impression that Ginny is easily trickedgullible, 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 Ginny’s attraction to Harry and foreshadows a future relationship

between them. Upon her rescue, Ginny cannot stop crying out of guilt, and this typical female

response reminds the reader of her overpowering femininity.that she is a girl.

As a final insult, Ginny’s own father blames her for her actions even though she is the

victim of a trick by the most powerful dark wizard in history. She sobs to him, explaining with

fear, “I’ve b-been writing in [his diary], and he’s been w-writing back all year–” and her father’s

response is, “Haven’t I taught you anything? What have I always told you? Never trust anything

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that can think for itself if you can’t see where it keeps its brain? Why didn’t 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). Rowling’s italics and Mr. Weasley’s attitude indicate that he is deeply

angry at 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 victim 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 occupy a

worthwhile role in the storyworthwhile 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 a n 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 Potter’s story, not Ginny Weasley’s story.

Just as “Hermione and her intelligence are simply part of Harry’s entourage,” can readers could

see Ginny as merely a part of Harry’s development and life? (Nikolajeva 131). Can Rowling

throw her to the side because this is Harry’s story, or does she deserve to have her own, fully

developed character? There is no right answer, Feminist criticism would ask but readers would

do well to consider the implications of a character that fulfills so many degrading female

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stereotypes, and what the story’s shortcomings caused loses by omitting her growth. Ginny’s

strong femininity and lack of anything else represents females poorly and shows the need for

well-rounded female characters embodying the wide range of personalities that girls possess.

Works Cited

Heilman, Elizabeth E. “Blue Wizards and Pink Witches: Representations of Gender Identity and

Power.” Harry Potter's World. N.p., n.d. 221-239. Print.

Nikolajeva, Maria. “Harry Potter – A Return to the Romantic Hero.” Harry Potter's World. N.p.,

n.d. 125-140. Print.

Pugh, Tison. “Harry Potter Class Lecture.” University of Central Florida. Health and Public

Affairs Building, Orlando, FL. 10 February 2015. Class Lecture.

Rowling, J. K. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. New York: Scholastic Inc., New York:

1997. Print.

---. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. New York: Scholastic Inc., New York: 1999.

Print.