Final: Women in Harry Potter

It goes without question that the Harry Potter series is one of the most popular literary events in recent history. It is adored by men, women, and most importantly, children. The story revolves around a magical boy, experiencing a magical world, filled with magical men, women, and children, some good, and some very, very bad. While the story is exciting and riveting to both boys and girls, what is the real message being sent to the little girls and young women engrossed in the story? Ironically, even though the series was written by a female, J. K. Rowling, the story features adult female character after adult female character fulfilling traditional stereotypical roles of housewives, schoolmarms, and evil monsters. Aside from strong, independent, intelligent teenage girls, who also have their own literary issues, the adult women that populate the story fit Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar’s “Madwoman in the Attic” ideals and do nothing to promote positive role models for the young girls that have fallen in love with Harry’s story. Gilbert and Gubar argue that, “. . . a woman writer must examine, assimilate, and transcend the extreme images of ‘angel’ and ‘monster’ which male authors have generated for her” (812). However, Rowling does nothing to transcend these ideals, rather, she presents characters that simply fit the stereotype traditional presented for years.
Perhaps the most ideal, most angelic woman in the story is the character of Molly Weasley. Mrs. Weasley is a devoted wife and mother of seven. Her only job is to care for her family, cooking, cleaning, chaperoning, and to worry about everything. Even though Mrs. Weasley attended Hogwarts and received an extensive magical education as a girl, her eventual role in the wizard world is to be the perfect housewife. As Gilbert and Gubar point out, “The arts of pleasing men, in other words, are not only angelic characteristics; in more worldly terms, they are the proper acts of a lady” (816). Mrs. Weasley is the ultimate perfect woman. Even though it is clear that she is intelligent and could possibly be self-sufficient, she is continually complimented on her cooking and cleaning skills. When the “good” guys organize a resistance force against their corrupt government, Mrs. Weasley main task was to take care of the children, cook for the assembled men, and clean headquarters. While Mrs. Weasley clearly represents the perfect mother, the mother every child would love to have, she also represents the limits placed on women in Rowling’s world. In order to be perfect, a woman must be confined to the home.
On the other hand, Rowling does also include demonic housewives in her tale. Both Narcissa Malfoy and Petunia Dursley represent the other end of the housewife angel. Both characters are also doting wives and caring mothers, but only when it comes to their immediate families. Rowling has also taken a male view in representing domesticity, “. . . patriarchal texts have traditionally suggested that every angelically selfless Snow White must be hunted, if not haunted, by a wickedly assertive Stepmother: for every glowing portrait of submissive women enshrined in domesticity, there exists an equally important negative image that embodies the sacrilegious fiendishness of what William Blake called the ‘Female Will’” (Gilbert and Gubar 819). While Mrs. Weasley takes care of everyone and everything she comes in connect with, Mrs. Malfoy and Mrs. Dursley do the opposite. They demonstrate that the housewife can also be an evil being, one that actively works against all that is angelic and pure in domesticity. Both women do their utmost, short of killing him, to ensure that Harry’s life is miserable. These women are not domestic angels, but rather domestic demons.
Some may argue that there are strong, independent, “good guy” female adult role models in the epic. Minerva McGonagall and Poppy Pomfrey are both apparently single, professionally employed women in the wizardry world. McGonagall is a senior professor at Hogwarts, frequently second in command to Headmaster Dumbledore and Pomfrey is the school nurse. However, despite their apparent roles as non-housewife angels or demons, the facts are that both of these women are limited to traditionally viewed “women’s work.” Simply put, McGonagall is a teacher, not the Headmaster, and Pomfrey is a nurse, not a doctor. Outside of school events, these characters seem to have very little in the way of social lives. Both women live at the school, apparently single, and both professions can be boiled down to taking care of children, a job that is traditionally viewed as a mother’s job. Essentially, even though they do not have husbands to dote on, they can be seen as housewives, simply housewives of students.
There are even women in the story that play even more perfect “angels” then that of the various housewives in the story. The most perfect angel that can exist is of course, the dead female, a role played “heroically” by Harry’s mother. As Gilbert and Gubar point out, “Whether she becomes an objet d’art or a saint, however, it is the surrender of her self – of her personal comfort, her personal desires, or both – that is the beautiful angel- woman’s key act, while it is precisely this sacrifice which dooms her both to death and to heaven. For to be selfless is not only to be noble, it is to be dead” (817). From the beginning of the story, Harry’s mother is dead, killed in combat with the Dark Lord. She is immortalized as the perfect mother from the start of the epic, even though she is dead. Rowling has chosen to epitomize the perfect woman; in the same way legions of male authors before her have done, by being as selfless and self-sacrificing as to have given her life for another, more important, male character. Throughout the story, Harry’s mother is placed on a pedestal, untouched and unmatched by any other woman in the story. She has saved Harry’s life through her sacrifice, through her love, by placing Harry’s life, a male, as more important than her own.
On the other end of the spectrum, are the female demons. There are two characters in the story that personify the strongest, most independent, driven, self-sufficient, intelligent women, Rita Skeeter and Dolores Umbridge. Skeeter is a feisty, driven newspaper journalist, willing to do anything necessary to get the story, and Umbridge is a high-level government worker, brought in to take over the school when the government feels that Dumbledore has failed. Both of these women have clearly found success in this wizardry world filled with men. However, despite their success in their respective fields, both of these women are evil. Skeeter breaks the law frequently and reports in accurately about world events and Umbridge is on a mission to destroy Harry and everyone who supports his “good” cause. These two women, the most self-sufficient and successful women in the book are not meant to serve as role models for girls, but rather as cautionary tales. The roles these two characters play are to warn young girls of the dangers of success in a man’s world. Rowling is warning girls not too try too hard, or else you may end up evil, just like these two characters.
And then there’s the literal madwoman in the attic, Professor Trelawney. This character does not teach any traditionally respected subject, rather, she teaches Divination, the “art” of predicting the future. When this character is first introduced, she is described as resembling a bug, “Harry’s immediate impression was of a large, glittering insect. Professor Trelawney moved into the firelight, and they saw that she was very thin; her large glasses magnified her eyes to several times their natural size, and she was draped in a gauzy spangled shawl” (Rowling 102). Throughout the novels, Professor Trelawney is looked down upon as a literal crazy woman by nearing all the students, and even most of staff, including Headmaster Dumbledore. In addition to her odd looks, she also plays the role of a madwoman when she makes her vague predictions about the future, “Her eyes started to roll. Harry sat there in a panic. She looked as though she was about to have some sort of seizure. He hesitated, thinking of running to the hospital wing- and then Professor Trelawney spoke again, in the same harsh voice, quite unlike her own . . . Professor Trelawney’s head fell forward into her chest. She made a grunting sort of noise. Harry sat there, staring at her. Then, quite suddenly, Professor Trelawney’s head snapped up again” (Rowling, Prisoner 324). Why would a female author choose to include such a negative representation of a woman in her novel? This character is not meant to be seen as “evil”, merely the silly lady who teaches in the farthest tower in farthest wing of the castle. Rowling has placed a female teacher in the role of comic relief, further degrading the idea that women can productively contribute to this society. Yet again, Rowling has allowed the male viewpoint of female as monster to take over another character.
Even when viewing the teenage characters, characters that are typically seen as young, independent, positive role models for girls, Rowling presents problematic representatives of womanhood. As Cherland notes, “Rowling, for example, often uses a discourse of rationality to mark male characters as reasonable and a discourse of irrationality to mark female characters as foolish” (275). This problem is seen most especially in the characters of the Hermione Granger and Ginny Weasley. Hermione is frequently set-up to play a foil to Harry. Where Harry is level headed and no-nonsense, Hermione is often to reliable on logic and even somewhat foolish (Cherland 278). For example, in Goblet of Fire, Hermione becomes obsessed with granting house elves equal rights. While everyone can agree on the logic and empathy Hermione shows in her cause, time and time again, Hermione is ridiculed for being foolishly romantic in her notions by both Harry and Ron, as well as the rest of the student body. Even the house elves themselves balk at her attempts to grant them freedom.
Similarly, Harry’s eventual girlfriend, and then wife, Ginny is also frequently cast in a negative light. Even though Ginny is strong and intelligent, quick to point out others foolish behaviors and is never brought down by others insulting remarks, Ginny is slyly and unconsciously cast in the role of slut. Throughout the epic, Ginny dates many of the boys at Hogwarts. While this can be seen as progressive, her brothers, as well as Harry, look down on her promiscuous behavior (Cherland 278). Additionally, as if to add insult to injury, Ginny is also Harry’s love interest. Based on his decision to break-up his relationship with her in Deathly Hallows, sends the message that love is bad, and by extensive, so is Ginny. Harry, using logic and reason, decides that staying with Ginny would only complicate his chances of defeating Lord Voldemort, and therefore breaks-up with Ginny, sending the message that being a relationship with a girl the wrong decision to make when facing any sort of adversary. Clearly, in Harry’s mind, Ginny’s love and support would not assist him and therefore, she must be a bad influence in his quest (Cherland 277).
And there’s Luna Lovegood, or Loony Luna, as the other students refer to her. Luna is a sweet and intelligent student; however, her biggest claim to fame in the novels is that she is crazy. Her father publishes a magazine that could be likened to that tabloid classic Weekly World News, and even worse; she believes nearly all of his outlandish, even for the wizardry world, stories. Rather than note her keen sense of right and wrong, or ability to rise above relentless teenage teasing, frequent Rowling commentary about Luna revolves around her turnip earrings, 3D glasses, and her belief in imaginary creatures. Luna is literally a madwoman in the making. While Luna does not receive a flash forward mention in the final chapter of the epic series, she does play a crucial role in assisting Harry in overthrowing the evil Lord Voldemort, however, even after relaying her important knowledge in subject of diadems, Rowling is quick to follow up Luna’s intelligent statements with additional blathering nonsense, “Daddy’s Wracksprout siphons -” (Rowling, Deathly Hallows 584).
Another seemingly strong, independent teenage girl in the story is the character of Fleur Delacour, a sort of exchange student from a girls’ wizardry school in France, and perhaps the most troubling female depiction. Fleur is repeatedly described as the most beautiful, graceful, elegant, and generally awe-inspiring girl the students have ever seen. The boys at the school are instantly smitten, and of course, the girls instantly despise her. Fleur plays the role of a Veela, similar to the Ancient Greek mythical siren. While she is the perfect girl that every girl seems to want to be, the problem with her role as the siren metaphor, as Cherland notes, is “What is obvious in the siren story line, so obvious that we all know it, so obvious that it is common sense? It is the understanding that female people are different from normal people. Girls and women are sexual beings with dangerous powers over men” (Cherland 275). As she continues, “The position of siren is only one of the subject positions offered to girls in the Harry Potter novels, of course, but it is one that is offered to them again, on a daily basis, in clothing stores, in films and music videos, in advertising, and in fairy tales” (Cherland 276). Fleur is a “good guy” in the story. She someone that the reader is meant to feel sympathy for, yet Rowling depicts her in a way that no ordinary girl could ever compete with, sheer perfection.
Adding to the problem of Fleur is her adult storyline. Fleur is a bit older than Harry, and therefore graduates into the adult world before the rest of the teenage characters. Her eventual adult role, much like that of all female “angels” in the story, is housewife. Fleur marries one of Ron Weasley’s older brothers, a brother that has been bitten by a werewolf, and becomes a cooking, cleaning, doting housewife. A major problem here is the message that is sent to girls reading the story, “The ‘killing’ of oneself into an art object- the pruning and preening, the mirror madness, and concern with odors and aging, with hair that is invariably too curly or too lank, bodies too thin or too thick- all this testifies to the efforts women have expended not just trying to be angels but trying not to become female monsters” (Gilbert and Gubar 823). In order for girls to live up to Fleur’s ridiculously high standard, they must give in to the pressure of being perfect, most importantly on the outside, and for what? To become a perfect, angelic housewife.
So, if these books incorporate so many terrible role models for girls, why are they so popular? It goes without argument that this series is one of the most popular in history, even though the world Rowling has created does not give girls a place to be successful and productive. Cherland theorizes, “I think she intends to entertain and charm them. But part of her charm is her facility with language and her familiarity with the story lines of humanism as they have appeared in European history. These have helped to make the Harry Potter novels wildly successful, because they help us to imagine ourselves as part of Harry’s world” (Cherland 279). Perhaps Rowling is just mimicking the world as we know it. Perhaps the popularity stems from the fact that Rowling is simply incorporating the cues girls receive in society today anyway. As Hubar points out in her essay regarding girls, literacy, and their place in society, “This implies that inequality between men and women is rooted in female personality rather than in capitalist patriarchy, an individual rather than a structural analysis. However, replacing stereotypical depictions of women and girls with liberated ones is insufficient to overcome women’s subordination” (89). Hubar is stating that putting non-stereotypical depictions of women and girls in books may not be enough to replace common notions of a women’s place in the world. As Hubar also notes, the roles women and girls play in literature a merely reflections of the options given to women in a particular time period (88).
Maybe the Harry Potter series is Rowling’s sly attempt to point out that women still do not have the same options as men in this world. And as for their resulting popularity, perhaps unconsciously, women and girls are accepting Rowling’s idea that females are still, even in this modern day, regulating to working in the home or school’s, continuing to take care of children. As Hubar furthers notes, “Girls are better served by novels that offer them not only positive role models but also a structural ‘map’ of social reality, one which reveals the historical development, and interrelationship, of the institutions of gender, race, and class. Such knowledge is crucial if girls are to begin to understand and to transform oppressive social institutions” (85).


Works Cited
Cherland, Meredith. “Harry’s Girls: Harry Potter and the Discourse of Gender.” Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy 52.4 (2009): 273-282. Academic Search Elite. Web. 20 Apr. 2010.
Gilbert, Sandra, and Susan Gubar. Rivkin, Julie and Michael Ryan, Ed. Literary Theory: An Anthology. Malden: Blackwell, 2004. Print.
Hubar, Angela. “Beyond the Image: Adolescent Girls, Reading, and Social Reality.” National Women’s Studies Association Journal 12.1 (2000): 84-99. Academic Search Elite. Web. 20 Apr. 2010.
Rowling, J.K. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. New York: Scholastic, 2007. Print.
- - -. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. New York: Scholastic, 1999. Print.