[HPforGrownups] Re: Harry, Ginny, and age appropriateness / Abusive Harry (combined answer)

[Melete]

No: HPFGUIDX 136077


Hmm I'm as unconvinced as Del actually.  


--- "Marianne S." <schumar1999 at yahoo.com> wrote:

> Rather than adressing things point by point, which
> we already know won't convince Del ;) 
> anyway... I just want to say this:
> 
>> If you or anyone CHOOSES to interpret that Harry is
> abusive or controlling of Ginny, it 
> seems nothing anyone can say can stop that. It is
> YOUR CHOICE that makes the difference. 
> It saddens me that someone would have choose such a
> jaded interpretation of the book 
> and think that JK Rowling is shirking her
> responsibilities and giving her (female) readers a 
> bad role model, etc. 
> 
I think we're getting off base here.   Del and others
are saying is not that the relationship is abusive but
rather that the relationship is not written well.  A
good writer gives us more than foreshadowing of the
relationship. I'll concede that there was
foreshadowing.  However, the relationship itself and
how it is written is done poorly b/c we don't get to
see it at all.  I find it hard to like Ginny and the
relationship when all we get is hearsay about her.  If
she is to be an important character not only to Harry
but also to the readership, the author needs to take
more time in creating her for us by showing us more
concrete instances in how she behaves, talks,
especially in her regards to her relationship with
Harry.  It doesn't take much more time to show a small
portion of their conversations, either pre- or during
their relationship.

The relationship is unbelievable or below the radar on
how much we care for it because we literally don't
know Ginny at all.  Everything we learn about her is
hearsay from Hermione, abstractly described from
Harry's perspective etc.  It would only take that much
more time to give us a few more scenes in which to
know Ginny, to establish the relationship or the
precursors to it as far as to why Harry cares for her
so greatly.  (i.e. some of those many times they were
together in the summer.)  

If J.K. wants us to love Ginny as much as we even love
Neville and Luna then we need more dimensions to care
about.  And obviously from her comments she does want
us to care about Ginny as a powerful, clever, caring
witch.  As for now, as a reader I've seen as much of
Ginny as one could experience life through binoculars.
 She is far off, hazy, indistinct and almost a rumor. 





> 
> And now it is my CHOICE not to address this further,
> and hope that people will consider 
> the author's Point of View when coming to their own
> conclusions about Harry/Ginny if they 
> in fact think it harmful. Because, ultimately, it
> was HER choice. 
> 

And it was her choice not to delve more deeply into
portraying Ginny's character.  She chose a shortcut
way of portraying her that plays upon my sympathies
not a bit.  So I also chose to consider my own POV,
and in a fine reader-response tradition, my
interpretation just found the relationship lacking in
emotional reverbation.  It was one of the great
disappointments for me in the book.  If love is to be
so important for Harry, why are we so cheated in a
glimpse into how greatly and why so greatly he cares
for Ginny.  

This is really what is at issue here.  Honestly, how
can we know how healthy/unhealthy the relationship is
when the relationship is given so little time in the
book as is Ginny overall in portrayal.  

If you want to think about this way, think instead
that I'm picketting for Ginny's rights to an honest to
goodness chance to shine as something more than a
cardboard cutout.  The only way we would have been
given the chance, would haven been to see Ginny rather
than just be told what she is like. 

IMHO again

Ellyddan


		
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