[HPforGrownups] Harry's happy death (Was Re: Harry, Sirius Black, and the power of posses

[Scarah]

No: HPFGUIDX 161718

> Carol responds:
> I'd much rather that he survived, and I'd be
> willing to bet that more than half the adult fans and the vast
> majority of child fans feel the same way.

Sarah:
I know of at least one internet poll that would disagree.  I also
don't believe for a second that violence doesn't interest children.
If anything, I probably find them to be more morbid than adults.

> Carol:
> Actually, Dumbledore's death is rather pointless unless Harry triumphs
> (though he was also, IMO, dying to save Draco and Snape). And Harry's
> death would be pointless, period. It's his victory that counts.

Sarah:
Is there really any doubt about Harry triumphing, though?  I don't
know of anyone who believes that Voldemort will win.  Harry will
either win while simultaneously dying, win and keel over soon after,
or win and survive.

> Carol:
> It's Hagrid who says that Sirius would have wanted to die fighting,
> and Harry responds by saying that Sirius didn't want to die at all.

Sarah:
Oops, yeah.  Dumbledore says almost exactly the rest of the thought
though, about how he wouldn't have wanted to sit at home.

Carol:
> And look at the life *he* was living, trapped in his parents' horrible
> house with Kreacher for company. Harry has a lot more than that to
> live for, including his friends and Ginny and his ambition to be an
> Auror.

Sarah:
What are the odds that his friends and Ginny all make it?

> Sarah:
> > And now, Harry's parents.  Consider the way the first war ended.  If
> > it weren't for the Horcruxes, the first Voldemort war would have
> been  the only Voldemort war, and we'd be reading "Lily Potter and
> the..." I believe this, the first thing in the series, is one of the
> most powerful motifs and must be mirrored at the end in some way for
> > symmetry.
>
> Carol
> As I said, we'll see the symmetry in Harry's willingness to sacrifice
> himself. No need for Harry to die, too, to satisfy that particular
> structural need.

Sarah:
That doesn't carry enough weight, though.  As you also said, he's
already had that willingness this whole time.

> > Sarah:
> > But who's to say any of them won't be toast as well by that point?
> > It's a war, people gotta die.
>
> Carol:
> People will certainly die, but if we want a bloodbath, we can watch
> horror movies or play video games.

Sarah:
Or read Harry Potter.  At one point we tallied up the body count so
far, it's into the dozens.  The last three books have all ended with a
major tragedy.   Applying pattern recognition should tell us
something.

> Carol:
> If he's living now, then the Prophecy has it all wrong: "Neither can
> live while the other survives."

Sarah:
It makes perfect sense to me, I just read it differently than you do.

I think there are two tricks in that sentence.  The first trick is the
word "while."  Everyone automatically interprets "while" to mean "at
the same time as," because that's the most common usage.  But that
isn't the only definition.  "While" can also be a simpler contraction
meaning something closer to "although" or "whereas."  "I like grape
popsicles while Bob prefers cherry."

The second trick is that there are three people in the prophecy.  The
one, the Dark Lord and the other.

So, I think that sentence means "Neither [the one nor the Dark Lord]
can live [past the end of the war or series] [although] the other
survives [past the end of the war or series]."

> Carol:
>
> Oh, aagh. The last thing I want is for Snape to accidentally kill
> Harry. He's already killed Dumbledore. That's enough of a burden for
> him to carry.

Sarah:
Yeah, but if you read my prophecy interpretation above you can see why
I think so.  I'm not really 100% convinced that the other is in fact
Snape, other candidates could include Draco or Pettigrew.  I just
think Snape's the forerunner at this point.

Carol:
 I'd much prefer for them to finally reach some sort of
> understanding and for Harry to realize that he needs Snape's help at
> some point in order to defeat Voldemort.

Sarah:
We're not in disagreement here, I think that's pretty close to how it
would all go down.

Sarah