Percy instead of Fred

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 175543

JennyPenny wrote:
>  
> > Percy should have been the one who died not Fred. Reason being,
Percy had only recently made ammends with the Weasleys and was 
forgiven. His death would have been the ultimate sacrifice for his 
years of traitorous abandonment.
> 
> Hickengruendler:
> 
> IMO, Fred is just the right victim, if any of the Weasleys has to
die at all. What would be the point in killing of Percy, other than
half (or maybe more) of the readership saying: "Yeah, that's what he 
deserves". I always rather liked Percy, but he is not very beloved 
among the fans, and in the last two books (prior to DH, I mean), he 
was portrayed mostly in a negative light, so his death would not have
 much impact. On the other hand, he hasn't done anything truly evil,
like Voldemort or Bellatrix, so that one could feel some real 
satisfaction about his death. IMO, killing off Percy would have been a
pretty easy way out for JKR and not achieving much, killing one of the
Twins is a much more daring move. And for me, it was a pretty logical
end to the end. <snip>

Carol responds:
I 'gree with Hickengruendler, if not exactly for the same reasons. I
may be one of the few readers who prefer George to Fred--he always
seemed to me to be the more sensitive and psychologically astute of
the Twins, and a little too willing to follow Fred's lead, but Fred is
usually funnier, and his death out of nowhere, in the midst of a laugh
shared with his newly reconciled brother, is just painful to Harry and
the reader, and even someone like me who didn't approve of half the
things the Weasley Twins did (ton-tongue toffee, the Montague
incident) feels the stunning blow. "The world had ended, so why had
the battle not ceased, the castle fallen silent in horror . . .?
Harry's mind was in free fall, spinning out of control, unable to
grasp the impossibility, because Fred Weasley could not be dead" (638).

JKR needs a death that Harry and the reader can feel together (other
than Hedwig's), a human loss that is greater than the loss of Mad-Eye
or even of Lupin, someone close to his own age whom he had loved
almost as a brother, someone whose death (unlike Mrs. Weasley) he had
never for a moment feared or anticipated, someone whose loss he shares
with Ron and, of all people, Percy. The loss is all the more poignant
since Fred, whose last encounter with Percy involved parsnip flinging
and contemptuous words (along with George's and Ginny's) is the last
person the reader would expect to extend the hand of forgiveness to
Percy the Prat (whose crimes consist primarily of quarrelling with his
family, returning his Christmas jumper, and mistaking Delores Umbridge
for a "lovely woman--probably seeing the light when she became the the
Head of the Muggle-born Registration Commission if not before).

Pompous Percy stumbling into the RoR, confessing his foolishness, and
Fred first teasing and then forgiving him, is one of my favorite
moments in the book.

"'I was an idiot. I was a pompous prat. I was a--a--'

"'Ministry-loving, family-disowning, power-hungry moron,' said Fred.

"Percy swallowed. 'Yes, I was!'

"'Well, you can't say fairer than that,' said Fred, holding out his
hand to Percy" (606).

And you can't. Remorse, redemption, forgiveness, and humor all in one
lovely scene.

And then, in a few short hours, Fred and Percy sharing a joke and a
second later, Percy lying across fred's body, shielding it from
further harm, refusing to move until Harry pulls himself together and
silently persuades Percy to help him move Fred's body out of sight.

I xan hardly bear to type it. This is life. This is death. This is
war. Suddenly reconciliation; sudden loss. Irony and poignancy. I like
Percy, the pompous prat who lost his dignity to wade out in the water
to Ron after the Second Task, who placed pride over the love of his
family and found his way back, but his death could never have evoked
the emotional reaction in either Harry or the reader that Fred's did.

Of course, the first time around, I was too devastated by Snape's very
different but equally sudden and ironic death to feel the poignancy of
this one.

But from a literary perspective, in terms of emotional and thematic
impact, Fred, not Percy, was surely the right choice. And having Percy
rather than George be his first mourner is also exactly right.

Carol, who despite approving the death from a literary standpoint
nevertheless feels deep sympathy for the Weasleys, especially Molly
and Ron and poor St. George