Roll Call of active women in HP
Sister M’s post about women in Harry Potter in response to the Salon article turned into a rant from me on the subject of Inactive Women in Harry Potter, a subject that I’m sure has been canvassed many, many times, but here we go again.
Sister M hits in that post on why I think my “favorite” two female characters in Harry Potter are Rita Skeeter (I LOVE HER) and Bellatrix. Not favorite in that I admire them but favorite in that no matter what anyone thinks, I think they’re strong and powerful and kind of awesome despite, you know, being supremely annoying in the one instance and supremely evil in the other.
It’s because they are pro-active rather than re-active. McGonagall is arguably pro-active in tiny ways - she, uh, puts Harry on the Quidditch team, but her actions never drive plot, and she’s almost always reacting to someone else’s action even if she’s awesome while doing it. If you look at the plot in terms of what drives the action, then nearly all of the women in the plot are stuck in passive roles. Hermione is supremely passive-aggressive throughout the books, especially regarding her relationships with boys (don’t get me started). Ginny is never pro-active. Like. Ever. She moves from boy to boy but apart from hexing, insulting, pranking and small acts supposedly designed to show her spitfire nature, the close she ever gets to an actual active moment is choosing (in book 5?) to defend Luna after spending most of the book making fun of her. I’m trying to think of more pro-active Ginny moments and they’re not coming to me. Probably because I HATE HER.
You could say that the entire plot of the entire series is driven by the pro-active act of a woman, Lily’s sacrifice - but since that happens offstage, let’s say it doesn’t really count and look instead at the women who actually 1) aren’t DEAD, and 2) do things.
All….. three… of them….?
- Rita Skeeter goes after her story. SHE TURNS HERSELF INTO A BEETLE TO SPY ON PEOPLE. ILLEGALLY. aksldfj And then after spying on people and digging up all kinds of dirt on them she just writes whatever she wants anyway. AHAHAH SHE IS SO AWESOME. I seriously love her.
- Bellatrix. Uh, where to start? ESCAPES FROM INSANELY DIFFICULT-TO-GET-OUT-OF PRISON TO BE A GOOD DEATHEATER. KILLS PEOPLE WITHOUT REMORSE INCLUDING HER OWN COUSIN. SORT-OF THREATENS TO KILL HER OWN SISTER. TELLS HARRY HOW TO CAST CRUCIO MORE EFFECTIVELY AGAINST HER, AHAHA. Seriously, she’s horribly insane but she acts more powerfully, more dramatically, and more terrifyingly than arguably any other character in the entire series, Voldemort included.
- Umbridge: Enough said. She not only acts on behalf of the Ministry but carries out her own aims at the same time. Whatever else you can say about her, Book 5 is the only time in any of the 6 books thus far that a female character has driven the action of the entire storyline.
- Narcissa: this is sort of indirect action because rather than acting on her own to help she is going to a man (Snape) for help, and it’s arguably re-active (though it’s not like she just woke up to the fact that her husband works for the Dark Lord), but bargaining for Draco’s life is a very powerful act, especially considering the way it parallels Lily’s own act to save Harry’s life.Other women who act on their own in HP - who act first instead of reacting to something:
- Fleur. Seriously, Fleur. Nobody *makes* her come to Hogwarts for the Cup. Moreover, Fleur chooses to leave her entire family, chooses to stay in England in order to date Bill, and chooses to marry him even after he’s all werewolfy. Every freaking thing she does in the series is characterized by action, bravery, and love. I love Fleur. GOD I HATE GINNY. Just thought I’d throw that out there.
- Trelawney - I’m not too sure about this because her prophecies drive plot in a major way, but they are also in and of themselves receptive. She sits there and delivers messages without actually acting, but the act of delivering the message, the whole message, is a predominantly powerful act in and of itself.
- Marietta. Active character. A sneak, but at least a sneak who PRO-acts rather than RE-acts.
- Last but not least: THE PATIL TWINS. NO SERIOUSLY. They go to the ball with their stupid moron dates Ron and Harry, and when their dates are sucky, THEY GO OFF AND DANCE WITH OTHER PEOPLE. I LOVE THAT ABOUT THEM SO MUCH. Seriously, it’s re-active to an extent, but seriously, they just dump their dates in the middle of the night. That’s pretty pro-active. I love the Patil twins.Uh. I should probably say more about Hermione and why I think she’s passive-aggressive rather than active, but it’s primarily because she acts in passive-aggressive ways only after telling Harry what she thinks, getting mad when he doesn’t agree, poncing off sulking and occasionally nagging while he and Ron do their own thing, and then taking some sort of rash (annoying) action like having his broom lifted and stripped for spells while he’s not looking, or doing nothing at all and then saying ‘i told you!’ when things go all to pot. I think the most iconic example of Hermione’s passive-aggressiveness comes in Book 6. After six books hinting at her interest in Ron, what do we get? SHE DATES A GUY SHE DISLIKES AND HAS CONFUNDED WITHOUT HIS KNOWING IN THE PAST, JUST TO PISS RON OFF, AND, WHEN THAT DOESN’T WORK, SHE ATTACKS HIM WITH CANARIES. Wow, Hermione. Just. Wow.
Feel free to suggest any women you guys think fit the description. I thought about putting Molly Weasley on this list, but she seems extremely passive to me in terms of actually influencing anything, either in terms of plot or in terms of her family. Almost to a fault.
Edit, post-Deathly Hallows, August 15, 2007 (Spoiler alert below):
I would definitely put Molly on the list post-DH because of her actions towards Bellatrix in the final battle scene. Tonks arguably moves into the category of what I am calling “pro-action,” though her actions still don’t drive the plot. Narcissa moves clearly into the pro-action - her choosing to tell Voldemort Harry isn’t breathing is crucial to the outcome of the final battle and a direct contribution to the climax. Hermione….I still remain torn. I think she became a much *more* active character, but none of her direct choices (that I can recall) affected the plot unless they were direct actions also being taken with Ron and Harry, or accidents like breaking Harry’s wand. I think in order to have power in terms of plot, an action needs to be a choice on the part of the doer, and it needs to go somewhere, lead to something else. And Hermione, all along, still remains a subsidiary character to me in this regard.
Ultimately, even post-Deathly Hallows, the actions that drive the events of this story are all taken by men, while the pro-active choices of the women are largely self-contained. My critique is not aimed at the qualities or detriments of female characters in Harry Potter, but rather at the way in which JKR has structured the plot to be integrated completely into a male-dominated society. Ultimately, the plot happens because of what men do - not women.
And that mostly sucks.
No arguments about the many weaknesses of women in HP, although I think your list [plus its omissions] shows that it’s not a matter of Rowling’s never giving her female characters anything strong or active or resourceful to do, but a matter of the composite impression she creates for each of them. I agree that this composite impression she creates is of the impassivity or frailty or fluttery femininity or motherly impotence [worryworryworry] or, yes, passive agressiveness or indirection of each of her fully-developed female characters. In other words, I’m saying that there’s a gap between the impression created by individual moments in these characters’ lives and the cumulative impression created by Rowling’s portrait of Hermione/Molly/Tonks/McGonagall/Sprout/Trelawny/Fleur/(even)Bellatrix’s habits of mind, speech, gesture, approach, etc.
Some specific thoughts…
Bellatrix: I’ll play devil’s advocate and remind you that all the adoring, fawning, panting, clinging devotion at the feet of her master is seriously disturbing (yes, JKR, I got it, Aunty Bellatrix is a rabid fan).
McGonagall: she’s formidable and has a series of character-defining active moments (including her battle with Dawlish et. al. that sends her to St. Mungo’s in Book Five), but her cumulative character mode is indirection. McGonagall is content to work offstage and within-the-hierarchy and as Deputy Headmistress, etc. It seems to me that Rowling presents McGonagall’s indirect sort of power as normative: in other words, I think Rowling proposes that women’s most acceptable avenue to action and most appropriate mode of expressing power is this second-in-command, working-within-the-ranks mode. (Hermione, Tonks, and Molly fit here — as do Bellatrix and Narcissa.)
Hermione: you seem to overlook that it is Hermione who creates Dumbledore’s Army. Yes, she manipulates Harry into it in a way that’s consistent with your passive-aggressive interpretation of her, but… she invites the members; she sets the agenda; she makes everyone see how it is in their interest to participate; she designs the spell that holds them to their commitment [and reveals treachery]; she designs the coins by which they communicate. There are a pile of other Hermione examples, so I won’t belabor the point beyond reminding you of Book One, chapter nine when they are running like mad to avoid Filch and Peeves after Malfoy sets them up rather than appear for his midnight duel with Harry, and, when they run smack into the locked third-floor corridor door, the boys despair… at which point Hermione rolls her eyes and then saves them.
When I was re-reading Book One (recently), I realised that this moment defines my sense of Hermione’s cumulative characterisation. I don’t see her passive aggressive mode of dealing with her romantic feelings as the defining aspect of her personality, though I agree with you that it is an impossible-to-ignore part of her. For me, the cumulative impression Rowling creates about Hermione is a wonderful blend of capability, practicality, readiness, resillience, and, yes, bravery (oh, Gryffindor!).
I feel as though I should address your dismissal of Ginny (I do think you underestimate that characterisation and that you’ve got amnesia about what that character actually does), but I also understand why she gives you hives (from her appearance as the giggly, infatuated best-friend’s little sister to her acquiesce when Harry decides they can’t go forward with a relationship). I don’t disagree with you about the unfortunate choices JKR made there, but I do think you’ve ignored most/all of the counter-evidence in the cumulative Ginny.
Last point: we can talk this way about these characters only because Rowling gave us seven books of character development for them, so that even minor characters and role-players (characters included strictly to perform a specific function) are dimensional enough for us to see more than one or two qualities in them and for us to debate which are their defining attributes and actions.
P.S. Hi! :)