Is Ginny's Sudden Personality Change Believeable?

[Steve Binch]

No: HPFGUIDX 76084

Buttercup's original message:

>I'm wondering if Ginny's 180 degree personality change
>is plausible. She goes from being pretty much
>unnoticeable to being almost a female version of
>Harry. In reality, which I know fiction is not, it
>takes time for humans to change parts of their
>personality they want to improve. And the
>transformation is usually gradual and may take years.
>I think it would be quite hard for a timid person to
>all of a sudden be brassy.

>Obviously, JKR did this because of the role Ginny
>would be playing in the last books, and she couldn't
>do that with a wallpaper personality. Possibly,
>Ginny's going to (a) play an important role in the
>second war and/or (b) hook up with Harry, in which
>case he needs a stronger partner, more like his mother
>who wasn't afraid to stand up to his dad.

>Don't get me wrong. I like Ginny's improvement, but
>it's just not authentic.

>Before OOTP when I read posts hoping that Harry and
>Ginny would connect, I thought, "You gotta be kidding.
>She's not right for him." But now I can absolutely see
>them together and hope they do. She's very much like
>his mother (red hair, fearless).

>I do have one problem with her though. She switches
>boyfriends a little too quickly for a girl of only
>fourteen years. One second it's Michael Corner, then
>Dean Thomas (Cho seems to do the same, floating from
>boy to boy). By the time Harry and she get together,
>she'll have dated every available boy at Hogwarts.
>They're too young for this.

>=====
>Buttercup

Now my original message:

I agree that Ginny's personality has changed drastically, but I disagree
that it is unbelievable. First of all, we barely even see her in books 3 and
4, so its been 3 years. Nobody's personality changes faster than a young
teenage girl. Three years is plenty of time to change. Second of all, we
don't know that her personality has changed in general, just in front of
Harry. Fred and George make comments throughout the series (sorry, no book
handy) hinting that Ginny is more than we see.

And about going through too many boyfriends for 14 year old? Who here had
strong meaningful romantic relationships at that age? I must have been 16
before I dated the same person for more than a month.

I feel that the drastic change in Ginny's personality only makes her a
multidimensional character.

-Steve B