Harry looking in the Mirror after HBP (Would Harry forgiving Snape be charac...)

[Jen Reese]

No: HPFGUIDX 164157

Carol:
> So as far as I can see, forgiving DDM!Snape promotes Harry's 
> progress toward growing up and toward defeating Voldemort. 
> Forgiving any other kind of Snape is either too much to expect of 
> Harry or insufficiently tied in with the compassion a hero must 
> feel for the people he is trying to save, none of them wholly good
> or evil, and none, even the most powerful and talented, able to 
> save themselves.

Jen: I didn't fully appreciate the magnitude of Harry's 
responsibility until reading your last sentence: '..and none, even 
the most powerful and talented, able to save themselves.'  *None* 
able to save themselves, not even Dumbledore, who may have died by 
Snape's hand but understood he was living on borrowed time from the 
moment Voldemort conceived his murderous plot.

JKR said this in the TLC/Mugglenet interview after HBP: 

MA: If Harry was to look in the Mirror of Erised at the end of book 
six, what would he see?

JKR: He would have to see Voldemort finished, dead gone, wouldn't he? 
Because he knows now that he will have no peace and no rest until 
this is accomplished.

Jen again:  I imagined if Harry looked in the mirror after HBP he 
would one day see Ginny, the next see himself getting revenge against 
Snape, the next finding the Horcruxes and Voldemort gone....!  

Was this Rowling pulling a Dumbledore and not quite answering 
completely?  Or are we meant to believe that Harry's deepest heart's 
desire truly is the end of Voldemort?

More important than my appreciation of Harry's task is Harry 
understanding the magnitude himself!  I didn't really sense pure 
resolve and desire in Harry from that one scene at the funeral even 
though he exhibited a greater purpose and seriousness than ever 
before.  He had so many distractions in HBP, from Quidditch to Ginny 
to his obsessesion with Draco, not to mention discovering the 
information about the prophecy and watching the scene on the tower.  
Draco was the one moving on with a single-minded purpose in HBP, not 
Harry.  Whatever the value of his choices, Draco 'put away childish 
things' and took on the tasks of an adult.  

I suppose the cave and Dumbledore's death were the transitions and we 
can expect a more purposeful Harry in DH.  Maybe Steve/bboy will get 
his wish after all, a Harry who will arm himself in any number of 
ways as he searches for the Horcruxes and sets *his* sights on the 
defeat of Voldemort, not only for himself and his own peace, but for 
all those who cannot defend against Voldemort's power.

Jen, who would see a good night's sleep in the Mirror at the 
moment. :)