Harry and Ginny

[Geoff Bannister]

No: HPFGUIDX 136109

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Marianne S." 
<schumar1999 at y...> wrote:

Marianne S
> 7)	Harry's breakup with Ginny (which my pre-teen student did not 
think was the end) 
> shows the kind of maturity and acceptance that I hope all teens 
have. Ginny, for all I can 
> guess, is not giving up on Harry
 but she's letting him do what he 
Must. 

Geoff:
I have to begin by saying that I have rarely read the "shipping 
forecasts" as, in general they do not interest me but, much to my 
surprise - in  view of the massive number of posts coming in and the 
difficulty for me in even keeping up with two or three threads, I 
found myself glancing at one earlier today and feeling the need to 
say something about the Harry-Ginny set up.

I felt that it was unfair for some posters to suggest that 
Harry "dumped" Ginny at the end of the book. He felt that it was 
necessary for the relationship to stop because of the danger involved.

This is not dissimilar to the real life situations of the two World 
Wars when guys not more than a year or so older than Harry went off 
to the war and many of them felt that it was only right and proper 
that links with girl friends and sweethearts had to go on the back 
burner because of the uncertainty of the future. Agreed, some of them 
got married before they went (I'm not suggesting that with Harry and 
Ginny by the way) but that was fraught with potential difficulties. 
To give a (fictional) example, one of my favourite books is "To serve 
them all my days" by R.D. Delderfield which charts the life of a 
young man invalided out of the First World War who goes to teach at a 
boarding school on Exmoor. In the early 1920s, a woman teacher comes 
to the school and confides in the hero that she had been married 
during the war and her husband had had to return to the front; she 
further tells him that they had enjoyed a week of marriage before he 
left and that he was now a shell, wounded, not knowing her and 
permanently hospitalised.

These were the problems facing wartime budding romances. And they 
still face Wizarding World relationships during the current state of 
war.

Perhaps Ginny doesn't see the whole picture; she seems to think that 
Harry is withdrawing on a whim.

`"We've got to stop seeing each other. We can't be together."
She said, with an oddly twisted smile, "It's for some stupid, noble 
reason, isn't it?"'
(HBP "The White Tower" p.602 UK edition)

Which, to me, suggests that Ginny doesn't see – or maybe doesn't 
know – the full threat to Harry. He tries to make this clear...

`"But I can't... we can't... I've got things to do."
She did not cry, she simply looked at him.
"Voldemort uses people his enemies are close to. He's already used 
you as bait once and that was just because you're my best friend's 
sister. Think how much danger you'll be in if we keep this up. He'll 
know, he'll find out. He'll try to get to me through you."
"What if I don't care?" said Ginny fiercely.
"I care," said Harry.'
(ibid. pp.602-603)

I wonder if this echoes a thousand conversations between sweethearts 
in 1914 and 1939?

Again, Ginny perhaps doesn't get Harry's drift on things.

`"But you've been too busy saving the wizarding world," said Ginny, 
half-laughing. "Well... I can't say I'm surprised. I knew this would 
happen in the end. I knew you wouldn't be happy unless you were 
hunting Voldemort."'
(ibid. p.603)

Seems a strange definition of `happy'. And we already know that Harry 
feels it is necessary to be alone.

`Perhaps the reason he wanted to be alone was because he had felt 
isolated from everybody since his talk with Dumbledore. An invisible 
barrier separated him from the rest of the world. He was - he had 
always been – a marked man. It was just that he had never really 
understood what that meant...
And yet sitting here on the edge of the lake, with the terrible 
weight of grief dragging at him, with the loss of Sirius so raw and 
fresh inside, he could not muster any great sense of fear'

(OOTP "The Second War Begins" p.754 UK edition)

He has not felt so isolated this year but he has been involved in 
things which have kept his mind of the isolation – at least until now 
when with  Dumbledore's death perhaps rekindling these feelings, he 
again feels these invisible barriers. Maybe, however, since all the 
Trio will be of age in the next book, he might feel – or be 
pressurised by them – to take up their intent to be with him.

Not all of the guys  came home after the two World Wars -  but some 
did. Hopefully, there may yet be a time and place for the ship to 
weigh anchor again