Molly Prewett

Families

Married

• Spouse: Arthur Weasley
• Children:
  • Ronald Bilius Weasley
  • Ginevra Molly Weasley
  • Fred Weasley
  • George Weasley
  • William Arthur Weasley
  • Percy Ignatius Weasley
  • Charlie Weasley

Parents

• Family: Married
  • Father: Unknown Prewett

Analysis

Overview

Mrs. Rowling has not given us a ton of information on Molly, especially considering how central she is to the books in general and to the Weasley family dynamics in particular. We know that Arthur was born was born in February of 1950 and started Hogwarts in 1961.¹ We have been told that Molly's birthday is in October,² but we do not know definitively if she was in his year at Hogwarts, or if she was a year younger. Either way, they married very shortly after graduating, and Bill was born soon after that,³ though there is some ambiguity on the exact timing of these events. There is room to put her in the year below Arthur, to put Bill as being born in 1969, and to thus say that she did not finish her seventh year at Hogwarts for example, or to put her in Arthur's year, Bill in 1970, or both, and allow her to finish normally.

Molly is overprotective, overbearing, controlling, incredibly generous, incredibly caring, and undoubtedly a tries, as best she understands it, to be a good person. That is not to say, as the above list of adjectives shows, to say she always succeeds, but unlike Dumbledore I truly believe that Molly's heart is firmly in the right place. While she does have the classic red head's temper, most of her vices are rooted in that she is "one that lov'd not wisely but too well."⁴ Some of these thoughts are similar to those of the author of Red Hen Publications in its article on Molly.

I think my biggest objections to Molly are as follows:

• I dislike the way she believes the press even when they write about people she knows.⁵
• I dislike the way she treats Sirius when living in his house.
• I dislike the fact that other than some presents in book six, we do not see any sort of birthday acknowledgement for the Weasley children, but do see her celebrating Harry's in several books.⁶
• I dislike the fact that she ignores Ginny and the twins whencommenting on Ron becoming a prefect.
• I dislike the way she belittles the twin's dream of a joke shop. I have experienced myself the hurt that comes when a parent dismisses your career as unimportant.
• I dislike the way that even in books six and seven, Molly will tell you that the twins are children. As a parent myself, I get wanting to protect your children, but I also understand that you must let them grow up. It is a hard thing to do, and must be even harder in a time of war, but it must be done for their own good.
• I dislike the way she handled Bill and Fleur's engagement. I believe that she, like most of the women in the series, is irrational about Fleur.

On the other hand, it is easy to be over sensitive.

• Some people have pointed out that Molly is parental towards Harry, but we see no indication of Luna, who recently lost the only female influence in her life and lives near by, ever coming over. Indeed, the fact that Ginny refers to Luna as "Loony" in book five⁷ suggests that the two are only classmates, not yet friends. There are possible responses:
  • Ginny may be over compensating, trying to appear cool and knowing that Luna is called "Loony" by her brother.
  • Xeno may not have been receptive to Luna visiting the Weasleys
  • Along similar lines, if the Weasleys were not close to the Lovegoods, [Molly] may not even have been aware of the extent to which Luna was in need of a moderating influence on Xeno's unique parenting.
• A number of people have picked up on the above mentioned comment about Luna, as well as the way the twins and Ron talk about her temper, to infer that Ginny, under Molly's influence, has grown up to be the stereotypical fake-nice-actually-nasty highly social pretty girl. Considering that all we know of Ginny is from Harry's perceptions of her, and only those that Mrs. Rowling chose to consider plot relevant, I will assert that they are reading more of their own past into this than what is actually in the text. Certainly our first meeting Luna is not a shining moment for Ginny, but as per above, there are a number of possible explanations.
• There is evidence that Ron and the twins (and perhaps Percy?) are male-chauvinistists. It seems more likely they learned this from their mother than their father.⁸ I had noted Ron's attitude myself, and once pointed out, the way the twins exclude Ginny from flying with them is much the same way of thinking. This one may have some validity. Any belief taken to an extreme will end up becoming a parody of the truth, but [Molly] probably has embrased a overly rigid and stereotyped distortion of the truth of gender and gender roles. See my own objection about her reliance on public perception, this really fits in with that.

Speculations

Platform 9¾

Any number of writers have made a big deal of the way that Harry initially encounters the Weasleys. So much so that it is easy to forget the actual details of that encounter.

At that moment a group of people passed just behind him and he caught a few words of what they were saying.

“—packed with Muggles, of course ”⁹

Unlike most who pick on on this encounter, I do not think that Molly is deliberately courting a violation of the Statute of Secrecy as part of a nefarious plot to pull Harry into a relationship with the family. If Harry is only able to catch a few words as she passes just behind him, then anyone who over hears her in a crowded and noisy train station is likely to assume they misheard her. Nor is it suspicious that a woman who has come to the train station for the last nine or so years might ask her children for a bit of information she is, herself, perfectly well aware of. As others have pointed out before me, this is perfectly normal behaviour for a parent, especially one who, like Molly, tends to treat her children as if they are younger than they are. In point of fact, Ginny, at ten, is still young enough that, in her excitement, she doesn't pick up on Molly's activity. I think Molly shushes Ginny in the next line, despite having just asked the question Ginny answers, because Ginny, unlike Molly, wasn't quiet, and thus did risk drawing attention from bystanders.

In other words, this scene is precisely as innocent as it appears to most eleven year old readers encountering it for the first time. That being said, I have encountered one reasonably amusing alternative explanation. RoseLilian, writes in one of her works that the Ministry arranges for a family to arrive towards the end of the boarding period, and to be purposefully noisy while actually being under charms to avoid attracting muggle attention. A magical child afraid or unsure of how to deal with the barrier will thus have a clear, friendly family to approach for help, being unaffected by spells that only target those without magic.¹⁰ That we do not see such charms being cast is not really an objection, because, as previously noted, the book is from Harry's point of view, and he did not notice. It is also believable that as Harry starts to be in more danger, the Ministry would assign the task to someone else.

After the War

I know of very little canonical information on Molly after Harry defeats Riddle. I have read all sorts of speculation about how she might or might not handle things, so much so that it is effectively impossible to accurately begin to give credit where credit is due. My own thoughts on the matter, admittedly influenced by the various depictions I have read.

• I do not think that Molly would handle things well. As much as she might want to be a pillar of strength for the family, she has just come face to face with her own Bogart.¹¹ For all that she was able to hold it together during the battle, I think she would have been severely affected after.
  • I do not think that Molly would be inclined to face the reality of [Hogwarts] not being safe. [Neville] gave us some insight into the horrors of life under Snape and the Carrow twins.¹² I doubt they were only abusive to the boys, or only abusive after Ginny left at Easter. Molly will not want to believe that. After all, she has insisted that Harry, Ron and Hermione have been safe at Hogwarts for the prior six years.¹³
  • I suspect that she will be unsympathetic about any complaints Ron makes about the past year. She will say he should have been in school (see the above).
• I do not think she would have easily accepted Ginny as getting engaged to Harry, particularly not any time before Ginny's finishing Hogwarts.
  • Molly is inclined to deny the reality of her children growing up, and Ginny is her youngest.
  • Molly is inclined to believe the press even when her own experience should tell her differently.¹⁴ Harry will always avoid the press, who will always be inclined to make things up about him as a result. This will result in all sorts of false stories about Harry dating this girl or that girl. These stories will make Molly doubt his commitment to Ginny.
  • Molly is inclined to be controlling. Even if she actually likes the idea, the fact that Harry and Ginny did this without consulting her will make her react negatively. The exception to this would be if Harry somehow avoids falling into the first two bullet points, gets Molly to admit to herself that he and Ginny are dating, and asks Molly about proposing before asking Ginny.
• The same objections probably do not hold true of a relationship between Ron and Hermione, assuming the two of them wait for Hermione to finish school first and for Molly to calm down about Ron not going back to school.
• Initially Molly would have been fairly strongly inclined to continue considering Harry as part of the Weasley family after the war. If, however, my thoughts on a Harry/Ginny relationship are accurate, then, I suspect that even if they do not "rush things," Molly will cool off on her support for Harry and will be quite happy about him moving out. I am unsure if she would go so far as to encourage it or not though. If they do "rush things" she definitely would kick him out in a fit of temper, even if she does regret doing so later.
• We are told that Ginny played Quidditch professionally after finishing school. I doubt Molly approved. I strongly suspect that she considers girls playing Quidditch to be unlady-like.

Criticizing Other Authors

It is extremely common for more conspiracy minded authors to state that Molly held onto Harry's Gringotts key for most of his school career. This contradicts the facts. Harry visited Gringotts on his own in his time in the alley before third year¹⁵, and while we do not know who paid for his supplies fifth year, it was Bill, not Molly, who retrieved Harry's gold before sixth year. Moreover, he did so as employee of the bank, not as the holder of Harry's key. It is only in the summer before fourth year that she seems to have his key, when she asks him to leave his school list out and then leaves a bag of his gold on his bed for him.