I don't see Harry dying

[Judy]

No: HPFGUIDX 72606

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "iris wrote:

<snip re: Harry's death> 

Interesting, especially if you include Dumbledore and the Twins.
> Fred and George are masters in the art of rule breaking, and 
> Dumbledore is the character who talks (CoS, chapter 18) about  
> choices.
> We mustn't forget the importance of those two parameters in 
Harry's 
> problem (killer or victim, but dead in both options, according to 
> the Prophecy).
> A prophecy is like a "meta-rule". So the question is: can you 
break 
> this kind of rule? 
> And then we come to the old debate about predestination and free 
> will. Is Harry prisoner of a prophecy, or is he free to rule is 
own 
> life?
> OK, in PS/SS, there is the word "doom" when Harry is sorted to his 
> Hogwarts'House. But instead of letting the Sorting Hat decide for 
> him, he manages to control his becoming, when he tells it he 
doesn't 
> want to be in Slytherin.
> Later, in PoA, there is Hermione's considerations about 
Divination, 
> and about death omens (the Grim): is it because someone sees a 
death 
> omen that he has to die inevitably? And if we consider the 
Prophecy, 
> it is a kind of death omen...
> Are people predestinated, or are they free?
> The solution, in Harry's case, isn't what we believe about that 
old 
> debate, but what JKR believes. She's the demiurge of her own 
> universe, of her own representation of the world; so she has to 
> choose the option by herself. <snip>

Me:  
Kudos, Iris.  I loved your post!

The biggest problem with most of the posts about the prophesy IMO is 
that they largely ignore the major themes that have been woven 
throughout all five previous books.  Choice is a very important 
theme.   If you look at the only other prophesy we have access to in 
the series,  there is an option for choice there: (Chap. 16, pg 324 
American paperback) " 
 the servant will break free and set out to 
rejoin his master.  The Dark Lord will rise again with his servant's 
aid
"    Had Peter Pettigrew heard it, would he have still gone to 
DV's aid?  Probably, but he never was given the opportunity to 
ponder his options.  He chose to do what he felt was in his own best 
interests.  

Now, we have another prophesy.  There is a set of disturbing 
variables which will produce one of two sets of outcomes.  We see 
that because he is unaware of the prophecy's full implications, LV, 
like Pettigrew, acted according to type and did what he thought was 
in his best interests--he set off to destroy that which could 
destroy him.  Our collective guess is that he would not have 
attacked Harry as a baby had he heard the full prophesy.  It would 
have been in his best interest to wait.  This would have set off 
another chain of events affecting Harry and the circumstances that 
make him the person he is.    Because of LV's choices, Harry is now 
presented with choices of his own.  His nature would lead him to 
confront LV once he has developed the magical combat skills, 
however,  in Book Five he is literally bombarded with negative 
results of rashness and unchecked emotion, beginning with the loss 
of the chocolate frogs at the beginning of the book and culminating 
with the death of Sirius.  Harry is now faced with a conundrum all 
wrapped in a deceptively simple prophesy.
I don't think it was for nothing that we saw Hermione challenge what 
we have all been calling Harry's `nobility of spirit' for so long.  
He is going to need to see the situation for what it is:  a very 
complicated logic problem, especially since we have been informed by 
Dumbledore that there are `other ways of destroying a man' than 
simply killing him.  (US edition, Ch 37, pg 840)  

Harry will need his friends.  This is another pervasive theme—`no 
man is an island unto himself.'  Once he allows himself to open to 
his friends, especially Hermione, he will undoubtedly see 
possibilities (choices) that did not seem viable before.  

Killing off Harry in a culminating act of self-sacrifice would 
undoubtedly be dramatic; it would also be quite easy to pull off--
apocalyptic in its magnitude and operatic in scale.  Killing Harry 
would be the easy way out.  More difficult, would be to write his 
survival in a dramatic but convincing manner that still manages to 
get JKR's main ideas across.  I believe she has opted for this 
route.  Harry has never yet had the opportunity to apply clear, calm 
rational thought to a life-threatening situation a-la-Dumbledore.  
He is instinctive and rash and emotional—this, of course, being 
indicative of his youth.  I think that the final confrontation will 
show us a self-assured Harry, making logical, confident choices 
against a LV who is still acting from instinct and arrogance.
Judy