What if Harry dies?

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 85507

"Geoff Bannister" wrote:
<snip>
My second point, which is more germane to Harry, is that, in "The
Last Battle",  the characters' POV goes over with them into the new
heaven. As I said a day or so ago, if Harry dies, then there has to
be an awkward shift in the POV at this point. If it were to happen
then whether we switch to an authorial/narrative view would have to
be seen. I realise that there are books where the leading character
dies and the point of view is carried up to that point ("A Tale of
Two Cities" comes to mind) but the narrative stops there. For Harry
to die and the book come to a full stop seems to be unlikely; it
would be too abrupt and would lack a full closure.


Maus argued"
> But there have already been instances in the HP books where other 
> points of view were used. The first chapter of PS/SS was mostly from 
> the perspective of Uncle Vernon, and the first chapter of GoF was a 
> combination of an all-knowing and Frank Bryce's point of view.
> 
> I'm sorry, but the limited third person POV used by JKR will not save 
> Harry from dying.
> 
> Maus (who loves a good drama with plenty of deaths)


Also we've been promised an epilogue, and epilogues are generally
written from a third-person omniscient point of view (as opposed to
third-person limited). If the narrator is simply generalizing about
what happens to the characters who survive the war, there's no need to
get inside Harry's head (or anyone else's). (Think of "All Quiet on
the Western Front," where the reader is tricked by the first-person
present-tense narration, only to have the protagonist's death coldly
reported in past tense by an objective third-person narrator. There's
a book I could have thrown across the room!)

Maus mentioned two instances of JKR using a POV other than Harry's. I
can think of one other instance when JKR, ever so briefly, slips out
of Harry's POV: her reference to Neville lying awake, unknown to
Harry, on the night after Imposter!Moody demonstrated the Cruciatus
curse on the spider.

So I have to agree with Maus on the POV, but absolutely *not* on the
way the book ought to end. (I'm with you there, Geoff!) I've already
given a number of reasons why I think JKR won't kill Harry and
suggested some possible alternative endings that would require more
imagination than killing him off (which is altogether too easy, as the
number of authors who have taken that route ought to indicate), so I
won't bore/annoy list members who vehemently disagree with me by
repeating those arguments. But I have to concede them the POV. Whether
Harry dies or not, JKR has promised to tell us the fates of the other
characters, and that requires an objective third-person epilogue.

Carol