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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” girlish

behavior, placing her firmly in the gender role of “female.” With no developed personality,

Ginny exists only as a love interest for Harry, and her importance in the second novel builds her

as a weakling and a damsel in distress to further her romantic relation to Harry. From a feminist

viewpoint, this character construction enforces societally expected gender roles and does not

allow Ginny to surpass the expectations of her gender or grow into a well-developed character.

Readers most strongly see Ginny Weasley’s extreme femininity in the first two Harry

Potter novels through her persistent crying. In the reader’s first encounter with Ginny, she cries

as the train leaves with her older brothers (The Sorcerer’s Stone 97), already starting her

characterization as a girlish child. People typically associate crying with females, which makes

her femininity much stronger because tears feature in 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” (313). When Harry wakes her from a

magic-induced slumber, she “[draws] a great, shuddering gasp and tears [begin] to pour down

her face” (322). Rowling goes on to mention multiple times that Ginny continues to cry in the

next scenes: “tears were still flooding silently down Ginny’s face” (326); “tears were still

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coursing silently down her cheeks” (328). Such persistent characterization of Ginny as a crying

girl feminizes her and indicates that such feminine behavior defines her.

Elizabeth E. Heilman describes Ginny as “the archetypal girl” (230), embodying the

essence of “female” quite strongly. Ginny displays other feminine behavior aside from crying

that enforces this archetypal conception. 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 Rowling

describes her as “wailing” (210), a verb not often used to describe boys. When a cat becomes a

victim of the monster in the Chamber of Secrets, Ron Weasley 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. After an attack on a classmate,

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 wrote

all year in what ends up identifying itself as Tom Riddle’s diary. Riddle says that she “opened

her heart and spilled all her secrets to an invisible stranger,” writing about “all her pitiful worries

and woes” (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.” Acting distraught, having nightmares, and

pouring out secrets into a diary all fit well into a “female” archetype. Riddle, although bored with

Ginny’s writings, kindly writes back, leading Ginny to tell him that she is “so glad I’ve got this

diary to confide in” (309, emphasis in original), a girlish statement.

As a typical female, Ginny must concern herself with romance as a crucial part of her

character. 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,

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she begs 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, her interest stems from

his fame and reputation. This develops into a romantic attraction by The Chamber of Secrets.

Upon seeing Harry in her home, Ginny runs out of the room from shyness. Ron says to Harry

that Ginny has “been talking about you all summer,” and Fred Weasley adds, “she’ll be wanting

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

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

continues, he notes that Ginny seems “very prone to knocking things over” and continually

blushes around him (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 acts shy and nervous

around Harry, continually doing things like “carefully not look[ing] at Harry” while in his

presence (286). When Harry receives a valentine “in front of a line of first years, which

happened to include Ginny Weasley,” antagonist Draco Malfoy accuses Ginny of sending it by

saying, “I don’t think Potter liked your valentine much!” (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. Teasing about Ginny’s obvious intentions comes from others, too; Ron

proclaims, “You’ve got competition, Ginny!” when another girl shows interest in Harry (326).

Ron’s comment, said in front of both Ginny and Harry, enforces the reader’s conception of

Ginny as a lovesick young girl who mainly concerns herself with wooing Harry.

The first time readers hear Ginny speak near Harry, she defends him from one of Draco’s

insults while glaring at Draco: “Leave him alone, he didn’t want all that!” (61). Draco takes this

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chance to taunt Harry further, saying, “Potter, you’ve got yourself a girlfriend!” and Ginny turns

“scarlet” (61). The reader finally sees an indication that Ginny’s personality encompasses more

than simply shyness 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….” (309). Her other concerns hold no importance; 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 results logically from her status

as a minor character; Hermione, a character readers see 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 Ginny’s sole purpose as a romantic option for Harry. Elizabeth

Heilman explains that Ginny’s attraction to Harry “disables her” instead of allowing her

character to grow (230). While Ginny does have a central role in the second novel, her

importance actually enforces Heilman’s idea of a character disabled by attraction because she

becomes a damsel in distress, easily tricked by dark magic, and needs a hero to rescue her. This

familiar trope gives her a stronger romantic tie to Harry instead of increasing her importance as a

character of her own right, and causes problems in feminist discourse because women should not

be defined by, or created for, men.

Ginny’s damsel in distress trope begins when Tom Riddle explains to Harry that Ginny

performed the school wide attacks all year. Riddle controlled her from the diary, which depicts

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Ginny as gullible, immature, and needy for pouring her soul into an unknown diary (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 (313). This

firmly places Ginny in her position as damsel in distress since she waits for a hero and does not,

or cannot, take her safety into her own hands. Agency belongs to the hero, not the woman, and

her inability to take responsibility for herself under this trope further diminishes and flattens her

character into quintessentially “female.” The relationship between hero and damsel 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.

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

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

anything 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–” (329, emphasis in original). Rowling’s italics and Mr. Weasley’s attitude indicate his

deep anger at Ginny for “allowing” Riddle to trick and control her, when in reality Riddle forced

her into her actions. Some readers will recognize this as a form of victim blaming, a phenomenon

rampant in our society, especially in situations where perpetrators sexually assault women and

others blame the women for bringing on the attack. For Ginny’s own father to blame her as a

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victim indicates troubling cultural and gender standards, yet this further solidifies Ginny as a

weak little girl who would write in an unknown diary and fall under its control.

Rowling clearly writes Ginny Weasley as an extremely feminized character whose only

character traits revolve around her romantic interest in Harry Potter. From a feminist viewpoint,

her potential as a well-rounded character occupying a worthwhile role in the story contrasts

disappointingly with the reality of her construction. However, readers must ask themselves: why

is it bad that Ginny is so very girlish? Should stories have archetypal characters that conform to

stereotypes and do not demonstrate the “ideal”? Perhaps writers should not banish these

archetypal characters, because they might serve a purpose; if all the characters in a novel

embodied idealized versions of people, there would be no variety (Pugh). Others may argue that

this story belongs to Harry Potter, not Ginny Weasley. Just as “Hermione and her intelligence are

simply part of Harry’s entourage,” 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 story

belongs to Harry, or does she deserve to have her own, fully developed character? Feminist

criticism would ask readers to consider the implications of a character that fulfills so many

degrading female stereotypes, and the story’s shortcomings caused by omitting her growth.

Ginny’s strong femininity and lack of anything else represent females poorly and show the need

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

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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., 1997. Print.

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