Ginny's development

[pippin_999]

No: HPFGUIDX 72699

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "David" 
<dfrankiswork at n...> wrote:
 
> My own view is that 'underdevelopment' is not the same as 'no 
> development' and that in fact, filtered through Harry's rather 
murky  glasses, we do see the same person.
> 
> To try to move the debate on a little, can anyone identify 
pointers  in OOP to those weaknesses of Ginny that *did* come 
across in the  earlier books?<<

Obnoxious sense of humor : tossing dungbombs at the door in 
OOP, those awful greeting cards in books 2 and 3.

Childishness: getting down on the floor to play with 
Crookshanks while the others are still sitting in the table in OOP, 
chasing the train and clinging to Mum in book 1.

Contentiousness: Arguing with Molly over bedtime in OOP, 
arguing over going out to the platform in Book 1

Easy dishonesty: This only becomes apparent in OOP with 
Ginny's lie about who threw the dungbombs, and the revelation 
about surreptitious Quidditch practice, but it casts an ominous 
light backwards over her actions in CoS. Can we still take her 
piteous "I d-didn't know" at face value? Did Ginny know well 
enough that bewitched books and objects that think for 
themselves should be regarded as dangerous?

 I am not saying Ginny knew exactly what she was getting into, 
but did she,  like my namesake Pippin in LOTR, know that she 
was acting wrongly and foolishly, and tell herself so, though she 
did not  listen? 

The flood of  tears at the end of CoS is perhaps less indicative of 
soggy helplessness and more the result  of a  guilty conscience 
plus the subconscious knowledge that  keeping the faucet 
running will forestall one of Molly's endless lectures.

Pippin