Washington: While the world waits in dread to see just how boy wizard Harry Potter meets his demise in the seventh and final book, a British Victorian literature expert believes that the threat is all hogwash.
Professor of English and British Victorian literature at the University of New Hampshire, James Krasner, says this is just author J K Rowling's way of taking control, much like other authors whose books have become extremely popular with readers.
He says that in the end, Harry will survive, and that by threatening to kill of Potter, Rowling is just trying to remind fans that the wizard is her creation and thus ultimately her possession.
"There's no way Harry will die. Harry won't die largely because these are comic stories, like Dickens' novels, in which good has to win," he said.
"Whenever an author's books become very popular in his or her lifetime, as is the case with Rowling, a tug of war starts between the author and the fans about who the characters really belong to. Rowling, like Conan Doyle (creator of Sherlock Holmes), is trying to assert her control. She’s reminding us that Harry is her character, not ours," says he.
"She can kill him if she wants to. Doyle actually did kill off Sherlock Holmes, but Rowling won't go that far because she cares about Harry. Conan Doyle was really sick of Holmes," Krasner added.
He also points out that such a threat is a pretty good way to hype interest in the book, something that Rowling also did in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix where she killed of Harry's godfather Sirius Black instead of his best pal Ron Weasly because while Sirius 'was an important supporting character, but not really a main character like Ron'.
"Harry won't die because Rowling's too good of a storyteller to completely undercut her genre. She's an extraordinarily careful plotter, not unlike Dickens, and she has worked very hard to make all the books emotionally satisfying. Having Harry die would be a miserable plotting failure," Krasner said.
So if Harry Potter doesn't die in the final book, the question remains who does?
Well, according to Professor Kranser, the two characters most likely to go are Snape and Neville Longbottom.
Readers might even get to see Professor Dumbledore, who died in the last book, return to life.
"Lord Voldemort has to die. And Snape, who is really fighting for good despite all appearances, will likely die. Neville Longbottom is really the chosen one, so I suspect he'll die," he said.
"Obi-Wan Kenobi, Gandalf-type paternal wise man mentor characters always die. This is a multi-genre convention, turning up in war stories, medieval romances, fantasy, adventure, cop movies, martial arts films. They come back as ghosts," Krasner added.
Comments
0 comment