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| I'm putting this picture in because I feel like it... and because I love Ron's expression when he's looking at Hermione. <3 |
Those Are Freckles, Not
Pimples!
(or, A Biography/Persuasive Essay of the Life of Ron Weasley that Shows
Why He is So Brave and Just Generally Awesome)
Ronald
Weasley was born on March 1, 1980 to Arthur and Molly Weasley. He lived in the Burrow with several brothers,
(and, by sometime next year, a sister,) doing whatever it is magical children
do. Actually, I really don’t know much
about his early life, so we’re just going to skip to the important part: his
Hogwarts years!
Ron
began attending Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry at age 11 in
1991. He quickly befriended the one and
only Harry Potter, and conflicted with the one and only Hermione Granger. He was sorted into Gryffindor House, the
house of the brave and chivalrous, so you already know he’s going to be great. Ron’s first act of bravery was on Halloween
night when he and Harry went to save Hermione from the troll in the
castle. She was crying in the bathroom
because Ron made fun of her, but the key thing here is that he rescued her when
he didn’t have to. And thus an amazing
friendship was born.
Later
in the year, Ron went with Harry along with Hermione to stop Quirrell (or
Snape, as they believed at the time) from stealing the Sorcerer’s
(Philosopher’s, etc.) Stone. He took charge
during the game on the giant chess board, even going so far as to sacrifice
himself in order for Harry and Hermione to be able to move on. If that’s not heroic, I don’t know what is.
Moving
on to second year, this was the year the Chamber of Secrets was reopened and
students (plus a cat and a ghost) were turning up Petrified. Eventually Hermione was Petrified as well
(sadness). So, when Hagrid was accused
of being the one opening the chamber, Harry and Ron followed the spiders into
the Forbidden Forest to find out what was going on. As if it wasn’t bad enough to have to go into
the FORBIDDEN FOREST, Ron was mortally afraid of spiders due to an incident in
his childhood. Yet he went anyway, faced
his fears, and was nearly killed when he and Harry encountered a group of giant
arachnids known as Acromantula. Keep in
mind he’s only 12 or 13 years old at this point.
Ron
also went down into the Chamber of Secrets with Harry when they figured out how
to open it so he could help save his sister Ginny. They didn’t really know what to expect down
there, but they still went.
Third
year! Ron’s bravery is best shown in a
single quote from the book: “‘If you want to kill Harry, you’ll have to kill us
too!’ he said fiercely, though the effort of standing upright was draining him
of still more color, and he swayed slightly as he spoke.” He said this when they still believed Sirius
Black was a mad murderer, so it shows that Ron was willing to die for his
friend.
Fourth
year was admittedly not one of Ron’s better years. First he argued with Harry when he thought
Harry put his name into the Goblet of Fire, which really wasn’t that
logical. Did he really think Harry would
say to himself, “Hey, I’ve almost died like, four times in my life! I’M GONNA GO ENTER A DANGEROUS, POTENTIALLY
LIFE-THREATENING TOURNAMENT!” Um,
no. Then he clashed with Hermione when
she went to the Yule Ball with Viktor Krum.
That was probably out of jealously though. And let’s be honest, if Ron was perfect, he’d
be an unrealistic character.
On to
fifth year, Voldemort’s back and Umbridge has arrived at Hogwarts, so of course
this means the formation of Dumbledore’s Army.
The D.A. was a secret group of students led by Harry, who taught them
defensive magic since they weren’t learning any in Defense Against the Dark
Arts class. And of course, Ron
joined. He was practically a founder of
the group. He also stood by Harry when
other students like Seamus Finnigan didn’t believe that Voldemort was
back. (Incidentally, I’m sad Seamus
didn’t believe Harry at first. I love
him!) Then, he took part in the battle
at the Department of Mysteries. He went
a little crazy there, but so would you if you’d been attacked by brains. That’s
not an everyday occurrence.
Sixth
year, again, not the best year. Ron got
together with Lavender Brown – honestly, where did SHE come from?! How many times did they actually talk to each
other before they got together? However,
it was sort of Ginny’s fault Ron wanted a girlfriend so desperately. She said to him, “If you went out and got a
bit of snogging done yourself, you wouldn’t mind so much that everyone else
does it!” If there’s anything positive
that came out of Ron and Lavender’s relationship, it showed that Ron was indeed
able to find a girl to date on his own who wasn’t Hermione, despite the beliefs
of a certain fanfiction author I told you about… Anyway, on a slightly related note, there was an adorable Ron/Hermione scene in
the Half-Blood Prince movie in the hospital wing after Ron was poisoned, and I
was very disappointed when I went back into the book to read it and discovered
it wasn’t there. (“He’s been poisoned,
you daft dimbo! And for the record, I’ve
always found him interesting!”)
Finally,
we have seventh year, or at least, what was supposed to be seventh year. Ron was part of the rescue mission to get
Harry safely to the Burrow; he was one of the seven Potters used to try to
confuse any Death Eaters they encountered.
He and Hermione also went with Harry on his quest to track down and destroy
the remainder of Voldemort’s Horcruxes, a quest with many risks and
dangers. At one point, under the
influence of one of the Horcruxes they’d found, he argued with Harry and left
for a while, a decision he’d immediately regret. Eventually, though, he managed to find his
way back, saving Harry from drowning in the process. He was brought back by the Deluminator, and
as he believed, it was given to him by Dumbledore because Dumbledore “…must’ve
known [he’d] run out on [them].” Harry
disagreed and corrected him, saying, “He must’ve known you’d always want to
come back.”
Once,
Harry, Ron, and Hermione were captured by Snatchers and taken to Malfoy Manor when
the Snatchers realized who they’d caught.
In the manor occurred (in my opinion) one of the best Ron/Hermione
moments in the series, and one of Ron’s best moments in general. When Narcissa Malfoy told Fenrir Greyback to
take the prisoners to the cellar and Bellatrix ordered him to leave Hermione,
Ron said, “You can have me, keep me!” He
was willing to sacrifice himself in order to save Hermione, which was a very
loving, selfless act.
At last
came the Battle of Hogwarts. Ron
participated in the battle, and really, anyone who fights in a war is very
brave. I don’t think I would’ve stayed
for the battle if I’d had the option. He
survived the battle (in which he got to kiss Hermione right in the thick of it
– very romantic! – and also lost his brother Fred – very tragic) and went on to
marry Hermione. The pair had two
children, Rose and Hugo.
Which
brings me to the final point of this biography/essay. If everything I’ve written still hasn’t
convinced you of Ron’s bravery, then look at Hermione. Unless you’re like the aforementioned
fanfiction author, would someone like Hermione really marry Ron if she didn’t
think he was good enough for her? You
decide.
That
concludes my paper on Ron Weasley. I’m
sure I could go more in depth here, these were just reasons I thought of off
the top of my head. I hope this has
convinced you that Ron is indeed very brave and just an awesome person all
around.
