Harry as Frodo or not?

[sistermagpie]

No: HPFGUIDX 176671

Alla: 
> And of course the main similarity to me is that neither Harry nor 
Sam 
> fail AND both of them get the ending of the happy family with kids 
> and all that. I mean of course Frodo's kindness makes it that in his 
> falling he wins, etc, but Sam IMO literally never fails, does not 
> succumb to ring, etc.

Magpie:
I would agree that Harry and Frodo have little in common, though I 
don't see much in common between Harry and Sam either. I have trouble 
with the whole "Sam never fails" idea, because while it's certainly 
true that he never fails, Sam *would* have failed if he carried the 
ring as well, because the task itself was impossible. It's not like 
killing Voldemort where you just have to do the right thing, it's that 
you *can't* do it unless you are literally God, which Sam was not. I 
think the scene in the Tower where Sam doesn't initially want to give 
the ring back because he wants to "spare Frodo the burden" indicates 
that. Failing was Frodo's mission all along.

Still, although Sam never does fail at anything he's an ordinary guy 
given a task that is very difficult but that he can do and has special 
skills for and he does it, but he's not put into lots of flashy 
competitions where he wins all the time like Harry, culminating in 
slaying the villain. (That said, of the two characters Sam comes 
across to me as the more competent, but this gets into the two worlds 
and writers being different etc.) They don't have much in common 
personality-wise at all, imo, just superficially at least that I can 
think of. If I was going to compare Sam to anybody in the Potterverse 
I'd probably choose Neville. (And I don't see much place for Frodo in 
the Potterverse at all.)

-m