Harry Potter: Ginny Weasley Really Wanted to Awake That Basilisk, Huh

Summary:

• Before his destruction, Lord Voldemort handed his Horcrux, the Diary, to Lucius Malfoy, who later “gifted” it to Ginny Weasley.
• Tom Riddle’s memory from the Diary possessed the girl and reopened the Chamber of Secrets, starting the Basilisk’s reign of terror in Hogwarts.
• Ironically, the Diary almost never made it to Hogwarts: Ginny forgot it at home and made her parents return to the Burrow to retrieve “her diary.”

The Chamber of Secrets’ opening was not the grand ceremony everyone had hoped for: it involved an ugly giant snake, scary wall messages in red, and a bunch of good folks getting petrified. All thanks to Tom Riddle Jr. and Ginny Weasley’s poor organizational skills; but few people know that the Chamber almost stayed sealed.

It was thanks to Ginny’s deliberate effort that the opening still happened!

Ginny Weasley Was Tom Riddle’s Puppet

Of course, we’re all aware that the Basilisk attacks were not Ginny Weasley’s fault: she was manipulated, gaslighted, and then even possessed by Tom Riddle — or, rather, the memory of him. The Diary that made her think she’d found a great friend was Lord Voldemort’s very first Horcrux that knew a great deal about playing nice.

It was Tom Riddle that clouded Ginny’s mind and made her do terrible things. She opened the Chamber of Secrets and woke the Basilisk from its slumber; killed Hagrid’s chickens to secure the murderous serpent; and wrote threatening messages on the walls of Hogwarts, scaring students and teachers alike.

There’s no way anyone would blame Ginny for doing all that — but she’s undoubtedly the person who ensured that Tom Riddle’s Diary ended up at Hogwarts.

Ginny Weasley Liked Riddle Way Too Much

Before the beginning of their second school year, the Golden Trio and the other young Weasleys were all leaving the Burrow together. Their departure didn’t go as smoothly as Mrs. Weasley had hoped since the family had to return several times: the kids kept forgetting something at the Burrow and needed to retrieve it.

One of those times was Ginny’s fault. The girl claimed that she’d left her diary at home and needed it back, making the Weasleys retrace once again. But Ginny didn’t have her own diary — it was the Diary of Tom Riddle, the now-notorious Horcrux!

Ginny Weasley was going to Hogwarts for the first time, and she was positively terrified of it. Thankfully, unlike her elder brothers, she already had a friend: by the time the family was leaving for Hogwarts, the girl had become buddies with Riddle.

Most likely, she wanted to try out the diary for herself and shared her stress over joining her siblings at Hogwarts with the inanimate paper, but someone responded. Someone kind and understanding, who helped the girl deal with the fear of the unknown and came off as a supportive figure that Ginny needed so desperately.

Of course, she wanted to take that wholesome guy to Hogwarts with her! But amid all the chaos, Ginny almost didn’t: she left the Diary at the Burrow and urged her parents to return.

By doing that, the girl unknowingly sealed her new school’s entertainment program for the year — terror, blood, snakes, and petrified people.

But hey, at least she had a great icebreaker with Harry a few years later! They connected really well on the topic of being possessed by Lord Voldemort, so there’s that.