When one reads the Order of the Phoenix, it is impossible not to notice the huge change regarding Ginny's presence. She comes into the picture very strongly, quite unlike the Ginny we were used to in the first four books, and she seems to have more potential for becoming a prominent female fighting figure than any of the other women we have seen.

In the previous books we saw Ginny as a shy little girl who had a huge crush on Harry. We never saw her as anything exceptional, not even as a person in her own right. This is, of course, because we see everything through Harry's eyes, and all he saw at the time was Ron's little sister. She never used to speak around Harry because (as I suppose we all know only too well) when you are in love, you tend to lose quite a few IQ points around the object of your affection. But from the moment she "gives up on him," we see her real personality start to unfold. She speaks up, she makes her ideas and opinions known, she is open and friendly; we suddenly realize she is actually quite cool as a person. J.K. gives us a hint or two about that - Ginny is very close to Bill, and he certainly is the definition of "cool" in the Weasley family. She's also close to the twins, and they fit into the same category. We also see that Ginny is very powerful magically, intelligent, brave and has a certain disregard for rules herself...

So what is J.K. getting at with all this? One cannot presume to try and fathom the depths of J.K. Rowling's genius mind, but I would like to venture a guess. Apart from possibly hinting at a future Harry-Ginny romance (which I will not discuss here), my guess is that Ginny is going to fill an empty space on the "good side" and be a prominent female figure on the battle field. The "bad side" already has such a figure - Bellatrix Lestrange. It seems a bit odd to me that on the good side, mainly men are prominent figures as far as fighting is concerned. I'm not suggesting that women don't fight... just that less attention is drawn to them when they do. Of course, there are women who seem to be very strong - each in their own way - but the strengths are not really about fighting. Professor McGonagall is very clever and probably very powerful, but we've never seen her engaged in battle. And couldn't a good Patronus from her have saved Barty Crouch Jr. from the Dementor's Kiss in Goblet of Fire? That one's always been bothering me, but as Professor McGonagall is very much like Hermione, I suppose that she just panicked at the time - because that's what Hermione does in the face of danger. As clever and brave as she is, she hasn't shown much strength in actual fighting. Rather she seems to panic and grab whoever's arm is nearest (usually Harry's). Mrs. Weasley's power is great within her family, but that's as far as we have seen it go. Tonks is up there fighting, but she's too clumsy and goofy to be taken seriously.

Ginny, on the other hand, has many qualities that make her a candidate to be one of the leading figures in the fighting. She has got a mixture of her mother's authority in her relations with others (remember her saying "there's no need to take that tone with me" with a raised brow to a very angry Harry? I simply loved that!), along with the twins' mischievous nature. She has got qualities that represent all four Hogwarts houses; she's brave - Gryffindor, she's intelligent - Ravenclaw, she has a kind heart and she's good to others (she won't accept anyone calling Hermione a Mudblood nor will she accept Neville saying "I'm nobody" when Luna asks him who he is) - Hufflepuff, and she doesn't hesitate to break rules and to lie "unblushingly" when she has to - just a teeny tiny bit of Slytherin? She also resembles Lily as we see her in Snape's memory - and we know that Lily was a fighter.

Based on all that, I believe we can expect a great deal more from Ginny in the next two books. Personally, I can't wait!

11/16/04

Posted by: Nicole