Natalie Barker, Blog #2

From the first book in the series we see a fixation on death. Harry is a character who is formed by the murder of his parents. Voldemort, whose name in Latin literally means “flight from death” murders Harry’s parents, taking their lives in an attempt to save his own. We see of all the emotions that have fueled Voldemort’s dark ambition: lust for power, revenge, greed; the foremost of these is his fear of death. The irony is that in his desire to achieve immortality, he sets in motion the chain of events that leads to his eventual demise. Throughout the books we see Harry struggle to accept the deaths of his loved ones. He is, of course, angered by his their murder and is driven by desire to avenge their deaths. Gradually we see Him realize that it is his capacity to love and be loved that differentiates him from his enemies. He goes from someone driven by grief and vengeance to someone motivated by love and sacrifice. In the climax of the series we see Harry willingly lays down his life for his friends. In so doing, he is able to do what his antagonist could not; he defeats death, rising from the ashes like the phoenix for which the resistance is named. A clearly Biblical parallel is evident here in the words of Christ mentioned in some form in all four Gospels: “For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it” (Luke 9:24 NIV). I think that Harry can be viewed here as a Christ figure. He dies and is resurrected leading to the defeat of Voldemort and the salvation of his world. The inscription on his parent’s tombstone is a quote from I Corinthians 15:26: “the last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.” It is also noteworthy that his parents lived and were buried in King’s Cross, a possible allusion to Christ’s cross. We see throughout the series that, while Harry has lost people he loves; like his parents, Sirius, and Dumbledore, they still live on in Harry's mind. We see that the love they gave and have been given enables them to achieve a different kind of immortality than Voldemort could ever imagine. This is poignantly illustrated by the names of Harry’s children: James Sirius, Albus Severus, Lily Luna. The characters that die, live on in the hearts and memories of those whose lives they have touched.