Ron in the Forbidden Forest

[joj]

No: HPFGUIDX 102978

Greetings! I'm re-reading SS right now and something is nagging at me.  Why did JKR have Neville go into the Forbidden Forest instead of Ron?  Why did she have Norbert bite Ron so that he was in the Hospital wing instead of getting detention with H/H/D?  He was involved in this sub-plot in every other way.  Why leave him out of the detention?  The bite didn't play into the plot in any other way.  JKR didn't want Ron in the forest.

He did go in with Harry in CoS but twice Harry and Hermione went in without him in OotP.  Why?  There was no reason Ron couldn't have been in there all three of those times.  It wouldn't have changed anything, having Ron there.

Another thing is, JKR sent in two revisions from PoA and one was correcting a quote from Mr. Weasley, about how many times Ron had been in the forest.  It's changed from twice to once.  

We know there are many flints that could be corrected.  Why change this one?  Do you think this could mean anything?

Joj

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