In anticipation of the last Harry Potter movie’s release, I have been rereading the books. While they are quite strongly male, there is a decent collection of female characters scattered throughout the books, none of whom I would mind having with me in a fight (except Bellatrix LeStrange). I’ve given a summary of these woman, as they appear from books 1-7. (To qualify, they may come into their own in later books, but I cite them as they appear.) B=book. So b1=book1. And obviously, spoilers for Harry Potter littered through the article. I don’t directly refer to events in the last book, although I expect it will come up in the comments, so maybe give this article a miss if you want to remain spoiler free.
Hermione Granger (b1). One of the main characters. A muggle-born witch (meaning someone with no family history of magic who turns out to have a talent), she turns out to be, well, bloody talented. She has both excellent reflexes when it comes to hexing and jinxing the school bullies as well as performing some hard-core spells against the villains. Hermione spans the whole series, and is a central part to Harry’s successes. And despite the reams of fanfiction out there pairing her with either Harry or Ron (and, I’m sure, pretty much every significant male character in the series) her romantic subplot(s) are given very little ink.
Professor Minerva McGonagall (b1). A recurring character who spans all seven books and plays a major part in many storylines. Harry’s form headmistress, a tough-but-fair woman who, like Granger, is one of the few characters to make it through all seven books.
Molly Weasley. (b1) Mother of seven children, including Harry’s best friend, Ron, and Ron’s sister Ginny. One of half a dozen characters who lasts the whole seven books. She’s a total mama bear, and I would not want to be the one stupid enough to stand between her and who she considers her ‘kids’.
Ginerva ‘Ginny’ Weasley. (b1) The youngest of Molly’s seven children. Gets a brief mention in book one, and comes into her own in the second book. And OK, she spends most of that book being manipulated by one of Voldemort’s alter egos, but from four onwards she proves herself to be a very capable witch, like Hermione having the talent and reflexes to perform both petty revenge and serious magic. And yes, she ends up one of Harry’s love interests, but in all fairness, they got all the way to six of seven books before going that route, and she’s not exactly pining for Harry in the meantime. Hero-worshiping, maybe, but so is a fair chunk of the book’s initial characters, so that doesn’t count.
Fleur Delacour. (b4) Part-enchantress, she doesn’t do a lot in the forth book, other than prove she has a bit more depth than being a gorgeous woman. But in the sixth book, when her fiancee Bill Weasley is bitten by a werewolf and Mrs. Wesley assumes the marriage is off now that he’s not ‘normal’, Fleur has a go at her for assuming she is so shallow and wouldn’t love Bill anyway. Mrs. Wesley backs off, realising her mistake in assuming that a gorgeous woman automatically didn’t know what words like ‘love’ and ‘loyalty’ mean; she and Fleur end up having a good relationship.
Olympie Maxine (b4) fairly minor character but a part-Giantess who forms a friendship with main character Hagrid, who is part-Giant. She’s Hagrid’s companion in finding giants to fight their fight, and while she barely gets a mention past book four, I still thought she was worth a mention here.
Bellatrix LeStrange (b4) Actually one of the bad guys, and doesn’t come into her own until book five, but man, she does well as an unrepentant bad guy. She’s completely crazy from spending years in prison – and probably wasn’t completely sane before that, either – and has killed God-knows-who many people, including the parents of one of our main good guys. She plagues the good guys, mainly Harry and the people he’s attached to, for most of three books. Given I was complaining that there are no ‘bad women’ in Underbelly, it’s nice to see such a woman span four books in Harry Potter.
Nymphadora Tonks – ‘Tonks’ (b5). Tonks is a passionate woman who is also a highly talented witch, with various talents such as being able to change her image and sense betrayers. She’s part of the Order of the Phoenix, basically the Secret Society Against Voldemort, and plays a major part in the last three books. I had an issue with some of her book seven storyline, but I’ll leave that to you to discuss.
Luna Lovegood (b5). She’s a conspiracy theorist, very flighty, but has moments of absolute clarity and insight. She is a loyal friend and a very talented witch, nonetheless, and plays a major part in the last book. Of the six students to go on a (failed) rescue mission towards the end of book five, she makes up one of the three girls.
Harry Potter is, of course, predominantly Harry’s story. Nonetheless, by my count it still contains at least nine strong, capable recurring female characters, including one kick-ass villain. And for me, that’s the ultimate role of good writing, that a story can be predominantly about one gender or another while still featuring a decent range of strong, capable characters of a different gender.
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Heh, I’m glad you’re scratching your points, because then I’d've had to be all, You’re right, in order to make that OOC plot point make sense, Tonks had to lose her muchness. So instead of Lupin getting some counseling and maybe going for a mani/pedi on his quest to self-esteem, Tonks had to stop having exciting hair, become boring, and change into Dora. Great, that was an AWESOME plot twist. Totally change yourself to be with your boring,angsty husband.
Maria(Quote) (Reply)
Spoilers for Deathly Hallows
Meh, I’m sticking with my ‘HE’S NOT GAY, SEE, FEMALE LOVE INTEREST!’ theory. But yeah – going through them again after all the points people have brought up (and yes, I can read that fast – most of the way through OotP) – Lupin does like to feel sorry for himself, doesn’t he? And I haven’t even hit HBP/DH yet :p
One of the things that really annoyed me about DH is that they both went into battle with a newborn baby at home. Yeah, THAT wasn’t a foreshadowing of their deaths. (Though for some warped reason, I thought it was cool how Bellatrix went after Tonks. It seems so in her nature to think her ‘family’ was especially disloyal and so deserved singling out.) I was thinking about why it bugged me so much, and I think I’ve worked it out: it comes across to me like Lupin was all ‘you stay at home and watch the kid’ and she waited until his back was turned and defied him. I’ve no idea if Rowling thought this was him being all romantic and self-sacrificing or I’m reading too much into it but that bit REALLY annoyed me.
Scarlett(Quote) (Reply)
Just reminds me of how many times Hamlet has been played by an actor older than the actress playing his mother Gertrude. No, no double standard ageism here, no way!
Patrick McGraw(Quote) (Reply)
So, really, in the great scheme of things, widening a thirteen-year gap to twenty-one years is positively conservative, isn’t it :p
scarlett(Quote) (Reply)
I’m a huge Harry Potter/J.K. Rowling fan, but I’m new to looking at books and films from a feminist perspective, so if my comments are a bit muddled, sorry.
I know the series isn’t perfect, but my impression is that Jo did a rather good job considering that her main POV character and villain are male. So far, no one has mentioned the apparent lack of sexism in the wizarding world. Two of the four school founders, and present day heads of house are female. There have been previous female headmasters and ministers for magic. Quidditch is played by men and women on the same teams. Women are portrayed positively both as professionals (the teachers and within the ministry) and as family orientated (Molly, Lily) people.
I’m pretty confused by many of the contradictory comments here, there doesn’t seem to be a clear vision of what a feminist portrayal of heterosexual women looks like. Some people seem to feel love interests weaken female characters, others don’t like them being asexual. And when you do get a character like Ginny, who is feisty, attractive and independent despite having relationships, people label her as a Mary Sue.
Does this not all get back to how critical we are of other women? Or is it just personal taste in how women are portrayed? How can a writer write about relationships (which are an important part of our lives) of heterosexual women without appearing to be obsessed with men? And how can they avoid discussing relationships not central to the plot without their characters being labelled as asexual?
I’m not saying that there aren’t bits of the series that I’d have done differently, I was a fan of the Lupin/Sirius idea and therefore I got annoyed with him Tonks a bit too. My impression though, of the way in HBP she was portrayed as love sick, was because we were being fed her actions as a red herring – the change of her appearance/patronus/appearing at the school were designed to make us think she was an imposter and when she turned out to be herself, there needed to be an innocent explanation.
Pamela(Quote) (Reply)
I’m pretty confused by many of the contradictory comments here, there doesn’t seem to be a clear vision of what a feminist portrayal of heterosexual women looks like.
Well, that’s because we’re not the Borg. We have differing views and opinions.
Does this not all get back to how critical we are of other women?
No, it’s criticizing characterizations, not actual women. Even insofar as we are criticizing the woman who wrote the series, you should read some of our criticisms of male authors. I don’t see anyone holding JKR to a higher standard than we hold male authors, for example.
How can a writer write about relationships (which are an important part of our lives) of heterosexual women without appearing to be obsessed with men?
Wha…? Seriously? Because the answer is really simple: the character must have plenty else going on in her life besides her romantic encounters/relationships with men. And no, it is not universally an “important part of our lives.” You’re making a statement on behalf of all women there. Some of us aren’t heterosexual, some of us are but are much more interested in our life’s work or something than our love lives, etc.
Jennifer Kesler(Quote) (Reply)
Thanks, Jenn, you put it more concisely than I could have.
Pamela, we encourage differences of opinion here, so long as that opinion is intelligent and reasoned. So yes, there have been plenty of contradictory comments on this thread, and on many others. It’s actually given me food for thought; I realise now that many of my thoughts were exclusionary to anything that wasn’t heteronormative.
Personally, I think JKR is a damn talented writer. But simply being a damn talented writer and a woman doesn’t exclude her from our criteria of ‘good women characters’. I think Philippa Gregory is a damn talented writer, too, and I’ve given her books varying critiques.
And I agree with Jen – we want to see more woman who can go through infatuation and love without having nothing better to do than pine. Look at Sarah Conner. Kyle Reece was the love of her life, but his death didn’t stop her fighting.
Jenn taught me a very good lesson about characterisation: reverse a female characterisation to male, and if it it doesn’t work, then it’s a bad characterisation. Imagine this: a twenty-something human Lupin, with awesome shapeshifting skills, pining over a nearly-forty werewolf Tonks, too old, too poor, too dangerous. Doesn’t work? Then she shouldn’t have written it in the reverse.
scarlett(Quote) (Reply)
And what sucks is that it COULD work… but the way it’s written is lazy and doesn’t, because it doesn’t treat EITHER character as exceptionally complex.
Maria(Quote) (Reply)
I know you are all individuals. I’m sorry that my comments came across how they did.
In particular, I can see ‘important part of our lives’ was a huge assumption and a silly comment (though by ‘our’ I meant people not women in particular) as it did assume that relationships were important to everyone.
I wasn’t claiming that every woman was heterosexual though, I was trying to say that with heterosexual women there is a danger that any portrayal of their love lives will come across as being about men when its actually about her emotions and sexuality. I appreciate the solution to this is to have them interested and involved with other non-romance plot lines.
As for non-romance priorities, I agree with you (even if it didn’t seem like it)of course there are those more interested in career, family (not necessarily having one, I just mean relationships with family members), friends, learning, adventure, creating art, saving the world etc. And there are several characters who reflect some of these priorities in HP – not to mention the priorities of the villains!
Pamela(Quote) (Reply)
Maria, have you seen The Boy in Striped Pyjamas? David Thewlis beats the complexity out of his character so you will never see Lupin the same way again… (Totally different movies, but it made me realise that, for all I love HP, she doesn’t give them much chance of complexity – they”re either ‘good’ or ‘bad’
scarlett(Quote) (Reply)
Thanks for replying Scarlet and I appreciate your explanation from Jenn about switching the gender of characters around, sounds like it might help me clarify my thoughts. I’ve also had a look at the discussion on writing better female characters started by Jenn for more ideas.
I guess as a newcomer to this sort of discussion, I must have been looking for some kind of solution about what is and isn’t a good way to portray women. Now I can see that was unrealistic thing, as real women are individuals and therefore no depiction of women is going to suit all of us.
Thanks, and I’m sorry I sounded like such a jerk.
Pamela(Quote) (Reply)
Pamela, I can’t speak for anyone else, but I appreciate your apology. I’s a school of hard knocks, this feminism thing, and I’ve learned far more belonginig to this site and opening my mind than I have any formal education. (Pity no job accepts ‘PhD at the University of Hathor’ as an actual qualification’.) You seem like someone who *gets* it and is wil;ling to learn, so I suggest investing in this totally free education. The only rule: Jenn’s word is law.
scarlett(Quote) (Reply)
I don’t think Ginny was a Mary Sue. I thought it was disappointing that one of the things I’d really liked as a very realistic representation of being a teenager, having an embarrassing crush that doesn’t work out and moving on, was just a cover for her still carrying a torch for Harry, but GinnyxHarry on its own doesn’t bother me, the same way Kataang in AtLA doesn’t bother me, though it does bother some people… And I loved Luna. A lot. I think she was utterly fabulous, and I think a lot of her character voice as a tragically misunderstood but accepting and relatively upbeat witch despite horrible circumstances in her family in the past (and present, in the last book I think?) was captured very well in the space she was given. She had some very excellent writing moments going.
Likewise, I thought Hermione and Tonks both got some inconsistent character portrayal going on; for example, if just the Weasley women hated Fleur when she started seeing Bill, I would think, “Oh, it’s a family issue, they just don’t want her to take him away, etc. etc.” There could still be other issues there, but it would be more justifiable than Hermione also hating on Fleur for really no reason other than she’s attractive. Tonks admittedly did not have the biggest part over the three books she was in, but to very markedly follow a path of “Tonks is pretty cool” to “Tonks is still kind of cool” to “Tonks, why are you so sad?” to “WHOA, TonksxLupin WHOOP Tonks died” is kind of weird. If there had been acknowledgment on the part of any of the main characters, like, “We haven’t been paying attention to our friends because everybody’s got a lot of issues going on” or “Life can’t stop moving just because ZOMG THE DARK LORD is coming” or even (as sappy as it is) “We should all evaluate the relationships we have and see if they’re what we really want them to be because life is really short” I would have appreciated that writing better.
I don’t think JKR is sexist, or even that her writing is sexist, I think it’s just got a lot of flaws that if she’d had more time to write the HP books might have been sorted out.
Also, I have had lengthy discussions with friends and family about the Muggle world/wizard world intersect before, so I get where you’re coming from with lack of wizarding world sexism. I was just talking the other day about wizarding world racism beyond pureblood/mudblood issues and colonialism within the former British empire– or if the former colonies’ independence was/is solely within the Muggle sphere, and the wizard UK still has power over other territories, etc. Also, whether or not Voldemort can/will go international (since even if Transatlantic Apparition is impossible, international Portkeys clearly aren’t), and the potential parallels to countries weighing whether or not to get involved in the early years of WWII.
Gena(Quote) (Reply)
THIS. Exactly. I have been going over this (and a POC/white reversal) with Disney’s Princess and the Frog to try and examine better the issues with that movie, because I’m having a hell of a time verbalizing them. Generally a GREAT rule to use.
Gena(Quote) (Reply)
Right, but what I’m saying is that isn’t there a scene in book 7 where she’s transitioned from folks calling her Tonks to people calling her Dora because it’s more adult or something?
Maria(Quote) (Reply)
The only scene I can think of is towards the begining when Harry and Hagrid arrive at her parent’s house and one or both of her parents refer to her as Dora. I’m inclined to give that a pass, because tehy’re her freaking parents and I can see that twenty-something years of ‘Nymphodora’ would get a bit tiring. As far as I can remember, everyone else exclusively calls her Tonks, even Lupin, apart from her first sceen in OotP when he introduces her as Nymphodora Tonks, she has a go at him for it, and he says something like ‘Nymphodora Tonks, who prefers to be known by her last name’. Given that she would have initially known several Order members in superior positions to her (headmaster, teacher, mentor, boss etc) I actually thought it odd that NO-ONE ever called her Nymphodora.
scarlett(Quote) (Reply)
I think Gabrielle was more like eight. In DH she’s eleven, I think, and that was three years later.
scarlett(Quote) (Reply)
Yeah, I now can’t watch/read about a female character without the back of my mind reversing it and seeing how well it works :p I’m sorry to say I’ve never thought to apply it to POC but it would work just as well. (I’m also sorry to say that there aren’t a lot of POC working in Australian film and TV as actors unless the role is specifically racial and vital to the plot – for example, Rabbit Proof Fence,about the stolen generation of Aboriginal children, has a primarily Aboriginal cast, but I can only think of two shows off the top of my head that had a lead character who was Aboriginal and her race had no impact on her characetr. Oh, and both characters were played by the same actress so maybe there’s an attitude of ‘we only need ONE big-name Aboriginal actress to cover any conceivable Aboriginal role.)
I’ve just been applying that to some of the characters in this list. Fleur is the biggest fail, I think: imagine a man who everyone bangs on about how good-looking he is but he doesn’t seem to demonstrate the talent that’s the reason for him being there. You kinda have Lockhart, except he was explained to be a total fraud whereas with Fleur we’re supposed to take her seriously as a talented witch without actually seeing/reading about her DOING anything to demonstrate that talent.
scarlett(Quote) (Reply)
I totally agree re:Fleur; literally, Bill, the Weasley brother she ends up with, gets more “badass” backstory based on his appearance and job description alone. In the first four books, he just kind of exists in the background as “Ron’s cool brother,” starts seeing Fleur, then gets the whole werewolf subplot. Fleur gets haters.
I did find Luna’s writing interesting; she’s an excellent character, and I enjoyed reading parts of HP that referenced her, but you know that if Luna was a boy, he would be depicted as the Cloud Cuckoolander Mad Genius before being Altered Perception Boy. I still think the “mad genius” thing only works in fiction, honestly (see: Fringe, PotC), but knowing that that’s the standard trope for a loopy male character just makes me more glad JKR didn’t go with the standard for a loopy woman: hysterical, past trauma as a cause for it, etc.
The thing with POC character writing is that– more often than with gender-specific writing– the character’s racial/ethnic/national identity deliberately informs the writing process of that character very strongly. Which can sometimes be used to tell important stories of racial/ethnic/national significance, or even to tell a story about someone where those identities mean a lot to them, but often it’s a sign of tokenism.
This is especially evident if the fervor for differentiation only exists within a Very Special Episode situation, and isn’t actually written as part of the character’s personality. Or even if cultural heritage is important to the POC character, a) within what historical/cultural framework does that exist? and, in a fictional universe, do the issues facing POCs today still apply, either on their own or in combination with newly introduced issues, fantastic or otherwise?; and b) is he/she considered the “representative” for their race, either in-universe or in the “real world”?
It’s just very complicated, is all.
Gena(Quote) (Reply)
Gena, thanks for those insights. I’m from the kind of white heritage that Hitler would have drooled over so I struggle hugely with white privlige and how certain portrayals of non-whites is offensive. Ultimately, I woudld love to see a world where the default characterisation is a case of ‘race? sexuality? religion? Political beliefs? Something Scarlett has overloked? Who the hell cares s’long as you’re a fleshed-out character whose motives are explained?’
scarlett(Quote) (Reply)
Not a jerk at all – I just tend to be blunt in my responses sometimes.
Thanks for reading our responses with an open mind.
Jennifer Kesler(Quote) (Reply)
Anne,
Maybe she felt it wasn’t important. Because it wasn’t, really. I’ve never really had a problem with it because really, how much did the readers really need to know about Dumbledore and Grindlewald’s relationship, other than they made all these plans for control and such?
She didn’t have to have Dumbledore come right out and say he harbored affections for Grindlewald. It’s just one of those ‘left unsaid’ things. It wasn’t essential that we knew. Rowling was asked by a fan if Dumbledore was ever married, in love, etc. And she answered that she always thought of Dumbledore as gay.
Also, the books were written in the 1990′s and were originally intended for kids.
Red(Quote) (Reply)
Red,
1. It’s important because it’s a part of Dumbledore as a person and a character. It matters because it changes the dynamic of Dumbledore’s relationship to Grindlewald. It matters because he would have been the only gay individual in the entire series. It matters because gay people need to be represented in fiction and not treated as though their personhood as gay “does not matter”.
2. You’re right, she didn’t have to have Dumbledore come right out and say it. But you know what? Considering a huge theme of the novels is LOVE, it actually could be relevant.
3. No: the books were not all written in the 1990′s, and the fact that they may have kids as a target audience has no relevance on whether or not a character is gay because being gay or including gay characters is not something which actually threatens children or is deserving of censorship. In fact there should be more gay characters in children’s literature.
That final paragraph makes me wonder whether you’re trying to say that books written in the past for children should be free from criticism? Because, well, I guess my answer to that implication would be no. I may sound harsh but to be honest those comments are not something I haven’t heard before when speaking of anything from gender to race to homosexuality, so it’s kind of gotten tiresome.
The Other Anne(Quote) (Reply)
The Other Anne,
I should clarify, since my handle changed. I, The Other Anne, was also the Anne who made the comment Red replied to.
The Other Anne(Quote) (Reply)
Red, I agreed with you here…
Because I’ve always seen that as a valid answer, both in the Potterverse and in other works of fiction. Part of good writing and realistic fiction is that all the characters are developed, well-rounded people, even if the audience only sees a tiny sliver of them. I think it was a reasonable decision for JKR to have Dumbledore, a mentor talking to his student, only relate the part of his past that was directly relevant to Harry. (I mean, that doesn’t explain the lack of same-sex relationships among the students at Hogwarts, but it explains that single facet.)
But you lost me here…
Because why can’t kids see Dumbledore as having had a same-sex relationship? There were plenty of hetero romantic/sexual relationships in the books, so it’s not the presence of implied sexuality that’s objectionable. I can only assume it’s the homosexuality that’s objectionable. And if that’s what you’re saying, I’ll ask you to check your privilege and rethink why you find homosexuality unsuitable for minors.
Sylvia Sybil(Quote) (Reply)
Red,
When you include hetero relationships but not gay ones, you are making a heteronormative statement whether you realize it/mean to or not. That IS important, because it erases certain people. It’s like writing a book set in the US with all white people, when in reality, I don’t know where you could possibly live in the US that you’d only ever see white people.
And the 90s were well beyond the point of hiding teh gay from the kiddies – we had gay characters on on TV when I was the age of HP’s target audience in the 80s. Check out this site to see what you’ve been missing:
http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~wyatt/tv-characters.html#dall
Jennifer Kesler(Quote) (Reply)
Warning to Red:
This site is for the critical analysis of media. Excusing stuff because of age and audience isn’t part of our mission statement.
Maria(Quote) (Reply)
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