Harry’s attitudes to dying

[Geoff Bannister]

No: HPFGUIDX 173863

Geoff:
I have just started my second read of DH but before I did, I 
re-read chapter 34 (The Forest Again). I am of the opinion 
that this is one of the best chapters JKR has written. Despite 
being the possessor of a Brit stiff upper lip, I was brought 
close to tears.

By chance, I am also working through the film DVDs and am 
currently watching "Philosopher's Stone" and am approaching 
the confrontation with Quirrell at the end. (I find that I watch 
them in dribs and drabs because o other activities).

This started me thinking about the number of times Harry has 
come close to being killed and his attitude and approach to the 
event. Harry's brushes with death have been varied; some have 
been unexpected, sometimes out of the blue while some have 
appeared inescapable to him and I wanted to just work through 
them to see what other group members can contribute to the
findings. The earliest references to Harry feeling that he is going 
to die are in PS. It starts when Harry  decides that, in Dumbledore's
 absence, he needs to take action:

`"I'm going out of here tonight and I'm going to try to get to the 
Stone first."
"You're mad!" said Ron.
"You can't" said Hermione. "After what McGonagall and Snape 
have said? You'll be expelled!"
"SO WHAT?" Harry shouted. "Don't you understand? Is Snape 
gets hold of the Stone, Voldemort's coming back! Haven't you 
heard what it was like when he was trying to take over? There 
won't be any Hogwarts to get expelled from! He'll flatten it or 
turn it into a school for the Dark Arts!! Losing points doesn't 
matter any more, can't you see? D`you think he'll leave you 
and your families alone if Gryffindor wins the House Cup? If 
I get caught before I can get to the Stone, well, I'll have to go 
back to the Dursleys and wait for Voldemort to find me there. 
It's only dying a bit later than I would have done, because I'm 
never going over to the Dark Side!..."'
(PS "Through the Trapdoor" pp197/98 UK edition)

Harry realises the likelihood of being killed at least intellectually. 
I wonder whether the full emotional meaning has dawned 
because of his age. It is also interesting that Hermione really 
hasn't taken on board the relative importance of House Points 
versus death! When the face off with Quirrell comes, Harry 
instinctively goes into self-preservation mode:

`"Master, I cannot hold him – my hands – my hands!"
And Quirrell, though pinning Harry to the ground with his 
knees, le go of his neck and stared, bewildered, at his own 
palms – Harry could see they looked burnt, raw, red and shiny.
"Then kill him, fool, and be done!" screeched Voldemort.
Quirrell raised his hand to perform a deadly curse, but Harry, 
by instinct, reached up and grabbed Quirrell's face –`
(PS "The Man with Two Faces" pp.213/14 UK edition)

Apart from Voldemort's repeated attempts to succeed with 
an Avada Kedavra curse, possibly one of Harry's closest 
brushes with death is in COS:

`But as warm blood drenched Harry's arms, he felt a searing 
pain just above his elbow. One long, poisonous fang was 
sinking deeper and deeper into his arm and it splintered as 
the Basilisk keeled over sideways and fell, twitching to the floor.
Harry slid down the wall. He gripped the fang that was spreading 
poison through his body and wrenched it out of his arm. But he 
knew it was too late. White-hot pain was spreading slowly and 
steadily from the wound. Even as he dropped the fang and 
watched his own blood soaking his robes, his vision went 
foggy
.


"You're dead, Harry Potter," said Riddle's voice above him
.


Harry felt drowsy. Everything around him seemed to be 
spinning
.


If this is dying, thought Harry, it's not so bad. Even the pain 
was leaving him
'
(COS "The Heir of Slytherin" p.236 UK edition)

Harry seems very philosophical here. He does not seem to be 
panicking despite the fact that he believes that  he is "a goner'. 
Fortunately, there was a Phoenix to hand to assist. :-)

Perhaps the first time we see the stiffening of resolve to face 
death as a deliberate likely outcome is in GOF:

`"We are not playing hide-and-seek, Harry" said Voldemort's 
soft cold voice, drawing nearer as the Death Eaters laughed. 
"You cannot hide from me. Does this mean you are tired of 
our duel? Does this mean you would prefer me to finish it 
now, Harry? Come out, Harry
 come out and play then
 it 
will be quick
 It might even be painless
 I would not know
 
I have never died
"
Harry crouched behind the headstone and knew the end had 
come. There was no hope
 no help to be had. And as he 
heard Voldemort draw nearer still, he knew one thing only a
nd it was beyond fear or reason – he was not going to die 
crouching here like a child playing hide-and-seek; he was 
going to die upright like his father and he was going to die 
trying to defend himself even if no defence was possible
'
(GOF "Priori Incantatem" p.575 UK edition)

This again, like the chapter I mentioned before if, for me, 
one of those superb moments in the books. Harry could be 
grovelling and crying for mercy but his pride demands that he 
keep his fear and despair from Voldemort – not unlike the way 
he refuses to give in to Umbridge in the detentions in OOTP. 
Perhaps this is an echo of the sort of courage shown by troops
in the WW1 trenches, knowing they were going over the top to 
almost certain death
 Mark you, only a few minutes after his 
remarkable escape, he finds himself in another apparently fatal 
corner when Crouch!Moody comes close to killing him. He 
seems to specialise in moments when it seems that death is 
going to overtake him and not allow him time to contemplate 
his immediate demise, one example being in OOTP when 
Voldemort decides to have yet another attempt to kill Harry:

`'I have nothing more to say to you, Potter," he (Voldemort) 
said quietly. "You have irked me too often, for too long. AVADA 
KEDAVRA!"
Harry had not even opened his mouth to resist; his mind was 
blank, his wand pointing uselessly at the floor.
But the headless golden statue of the wizard in the fountain 
had sprung alive, leaping from its plinth to land with a crash 
on the floor between Harry and Voldemort.'
(OOTP "The Only One He ever Feared" p.717 UK edition)

Again, our poor hero is subjected to another crisis just after 
the near-miss above, when Voldemort briefly possesses him:

`Then Harry's scar burst open and he knew he was dead: it 
was pain beyond imagining, pain past endurance –
He was gone from the hall, he was locked in the coils of a 
creature with red eyes, so tightly bound that Harry did not 
know where his body ended and the creature's began: they 
were fused together, bound by pain and there was no escape –
And when the creature spoke, it used Harry's mouth so that 
in his agony he felt his jaw move

"Kill me now, Dumbledore
"
Blinded and dying, every part of him screaming for release, 
Harry felt the creature use him again

"If death is nothing, Dumbledore, kill the boy
"
Let the pain stop, thought Harry
 let him kill us.. end it, 
Dumbledore
 death is nothing to this

And I'll see Sirius again

(OOTP "The Only One He ever Feared" p.719/20 UK edition)

Which brings us full circle to the Deathly Hallows chapter 
with which I began. I have not listed absolutely every occasion 
when Harry has faced a threat on his life. Voldemort seems to 
have been particularly inept; maybe using a copper saucepan 
might have been more effective than the series of Killing Curses 
which, for one reason or another, haven't worked.

We have seen how Harry started out accepting intellectually that 
he was liable to be killed but maybe this hadn't clicked at the 
emotional level. We have seen the out-of-the-blue occasions 
and we have seen how he has matured to a character who can, 
as Shakespeare puts it "screw your courage to the sticking-place" 
and resolutely handle a situation which seems to have no other 
resolution other than death.

I have often said that Harry is an everyman – usually in a Christian 
context, but here, we can see that he reveals the sort of courage 
and firmness of resolve which has been shown by so many others 
from the young troops of the First World War to those brave but 
doomed souls who elected to bring down the fourth hijacked 
American plane on 11th September to their timing rather than 
allowing the terrorists to complete their own plans, which in 
effect is what Harry chooses to do. He may be rash, 
quick-tempered and not industrious but he has a will of iron 
at those moments when the fate of the Wizarding world rests 
on what happens to Harry Potter.