Fates worse than death (was Re: "Why didn't Dumbledore try ...)

[Janet Anderson]

No: HPFGUIDX 113900

Carol said:

>(And it's probably true that there
>are fates worse than death, including, just possibly, the inability to
>die--a nice little lesson for "Tom" to think about if he will, though
>he probably won't.)

Oh, definitely.  On the one hand, we have Dumbledore explaining to Harry, 
who voices concern about Flamel and his wife, that dying at an appropriate 
time is not to be feared or avoided.  We have Sirius Black telling Peter 
Pettigrew that if necessary he should have died rather than betray his 
friends.  We have Nearly Headless Nick saying that being a ghost is, in some 
ways, evidence of a final failure -- being too much afraid of death to 
completely go through with it.  And finally, we have Quirrel/Voldemort 
keeping himself alive by drinking unicorn blood, an action which will 
maintain physical life but leave the drinker cursed.

In *The Magician's Nephew* by C. S. Lewis, the protagonist is tempted to 
steal one of the apples that provide eternal life, to give to his ailing 
mother.  He does not, but Jadis the witch does steal one and eats it, and 
according to Aslan she regrets it, even though she got what she wanted.  And 
Aslan tells the protagonist that if he had given the apple to his mother 
after stealing it, there would have come a time when they would both have 
wished she had died instead of recovering.

And one of my favorite sad poems is "Tithonus," by Tennyson, which retells 
the myth of Tithonus, whose lover was the goddess of the dawn.  She asked 
the other gods for the gift of eternal life for Tithonus, but forgot to also 
specify eternal youth, so Tithonus couldn't die, but got older and older and 
older until he was so shrunken and mindless that the goddess turned him into 
a grasshopper.

A more sinister story by Lord Dunsany tells of someone who angered the god 
of Death, and was therefore left alive ... forever.  He didn't even get to 
be a grasshopper; he became a mouldering pile of bones ... but still alive 
and praying for Death to forgive him.

Hmm. All this doesn't bode well for Voldemort and his quest for eternal 
life, does it?


Janet Anderson

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