Harry Potter: A Horcrux

[Geoff Bannister]

No: HPFGUIDX 151058

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Leonard Kim" <muhahawa at ...> wrote:

muhahava:
> Assuming all other Horcruxes are disposed of ...
 
> the most basic outcome, which has been proposed here before is that 
> if Harry is a horcrux, then he has to die in book 7.  If that is in 
> fact true, then somebody else must be tabbed to vanquish Voldemort (a 
> phoenix-like re-risen Dumbledore, "good" Snape, etc.).  That wouldn't 
> necessarily be inconsistent with the prophecy, since presumably 
> Voldemort will be the one to have killed Harry, thus making himself 
> vulnerable just when he thinks he has triumphed.  Yet, I think this 
> would be a nearly impossible scenario to pull off in a way that would 
> be satisfying either in a literary sense or to the readers.
> 
> A slightly more complicated scenario, again I'm sure somebody's 
> thought of this -- not only is there a piece of Voldemort in Harry, 
> but after GOF, there is a piece of Harry in Voldemort.  Obviously 
> Harry hasn't murdered anybody, but this could mean that Voldemort is 
> de facto a kind of Horcrux for Harry.  That makes something like the 
> following sequence of events possible: 1) False tragic ending: 
> Voldemort "kills" Harry, in the process destroying the Harry/scar 
> Horcrux.  However, Harry is not dead dead because some part of him 
> lives on inside Voldemort.  (Just as Voldemort was not dead dead 
> after having a killing curse rebound on him.) 2) Somehow, that 
> essence of Harry is extracted from Voldemort and used to restore him 
> in a scene that parallels the end of GOF and in the actual climactic 
> ending, revived Harry vanquishes Voldemort.
> 
> Of course, that event sequence is purely speculative and unlikely, 
> but it does follow from the observations that not only does Harry 
> unquestionably have some essence of Voldemort transferred to him, but 
> the opposite is also true.  

<snip>

Geoff:

I apologise for having to be repetitive but I am going to quote something I wrote in post 
140343, back in September last year and actually repeated as recently as post 150494 on 
this question of Harry being a Horcrux.

<quote>
I believe that if Harry is a Horcrux with a soul fragment inside him,
this would be a plot device which would create problems and possible
paradoxes within the Potterverse which Jo Rowling has crafted.

One of the points which has often been made about the Harry Potter
world is that choice is paramount to the action. The pivotal
statement is probably the oft-quoted one made by Dumbledore in Book
2: "It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more
than our abilities." (COS "Dobby's Reward" p.245 UK edition)

Harry has made choices – sometimes consciously, sometimes not – which
have guided him towards the side of light, of compassion and
acceptance of the need to be prepared to tackle Voldemort.  Tom
Riddle, on the other hand, has set his mind to becoming powerful and
has chosen evil and selfish ways of doing it. Others, such as Snape
and more recently Draco, are making choices which are rather
ambivalent leaving us still uncertain about where their final
loyalties will lie. I feel that this possibly reflects Jo Rowling's
views on Christianity. The Christian faith is a faith of choices. No
one is a Christian by birth or privilege but by choice. But, if Harry
is a Horcrux, this ability to choose is being seriously eroded and
there then seems to be an argument for those who take the Calvinistic
view of predestination.

Let us therefore consider the various scenarios which might emerge if
Harry is indeed "encasing"  a piece of You-Know-Who's soul. If he is,
then it would seem that, in order to kill Voldemort, he will have to
sacrifice himself to do it. If he chooses to walk away from the
situation and decides to ignore the prophecy, then he is condemning
the Wizarding World to a likely takeover by the Death Eaters. Even
then, his security would not be guaranteed because Voldemort would
still feel unsafe as long as Harry was around so our hero would spend
his time in hiding, looking over his shoulder all the time and
knowing that he had left his friends to the tender mercy of the Dark
side.

But we do know from Book 6 that he is deciding to face up to
Voldemort. Ginny says "I knew this would happen in the end. I knew
you wouldn't be happy unless you were hunting Voldemort." And for
Harry himself, `Moving felt much more bearable than sitting still:
just as setting out as soon as possible to track down the Horcruxes
and kill Voldemort would feel better than waiting to do it.'
(HBP "The White Tomb" p.603 UK edition)

However, this is where our paradoxes begin to raise their heads.
Harry arrives for a stand-off with the Dark Lord having dealt with
all the other Horcruxes. I can see three scenarios here, all of which
present problems if Harry is a Horcrux.

Number one. Harry apparently kills Voldemort. The last remnant of
soul in him is destroyed but – there is still a piece of soul in
Harry. What happens? Does Voldemort become disembodied again? What
happens if you have a piece of soul but it is not within you? Does he
become an empty shell like a soul-sucked Dementor victim? Or would he
be able in some disembodied way to seize on the piece in Harry? I am
reminded of the Lord of the Rings here when Gandalf says that, if the
Ring is thrown into Mount Doom, Sauron would not die but fall so far
that the possibility of him arising again could not even be imagined.
Would that happen here and Voldemort become almost a ghost figure?
Presumably, as per the words of the prophecy, Harry would have
vanquished him, but what of the future?

Number two. Voldemort kills Harry. this is the worst case scenario
because it would leave Voldemort as the victor in possession of the
tattered remnants of his soul and with no viable opposition to him. A
new Dark age would descend upon the Wizarding world.

Number three. This I consider to have a low probability. They fire
spells at each other and kill other simultaneously and both soul
fragments are destroyed. The last time they did something like this,
we saw the Priori Incantatem effect. If, as I imagine, they are still
using the "brother wands", Dumbledore says that "they will not work
properly against each other.." (GOF "The Parting of the Ways" p.605
UK edition). So, unless the spells do not "collide" there is a very
low likelihood of them killing each other.

My feeling is, that for the purposes of the plot, scenario two seems
to be unlikely. I cannot see Jo Rowling, having brought us so far
along the way, allowing Voldemort to win by a flick of the wand.
Scenario one provides an unsatisfying resolution to the problem of
really vanquishing him and scenario three hints at a rerun of the GOF
event which would leave the fulfilment of the prophecy unresolved.

So, for better or for worse, I'm sticking with the Harry-is-not-a-
Horcrux camp as I feel that, within our fictional universe, JKR needs
to show that the choices, the efforts, the sacrifices of those whose
have stood alongside Harry, and those who have taught him to use his
gifts have not worked in vain. This is not the real world, it is
fantasy and we need a satisfying closure.
</quote>