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THE WORST IS COMING... WHY DOES SOMEONE HAVE TO DIE? The "Bad Death" After finishing her fourth book, J.K. Rowling cautioned us: "There's worse coming...."(1) Now J.K. Rowling has divulged that a "bad death"(2) will occur in Book 5 (Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix), and the rumors are flying through cyberspace! Will it be Hagrid? Dumbledore? Mrs. Weasley? J.K.R. has warned us that there are, in fact, going to be many deaths in this struggle with the evil wizard, Voldemort. So, why do there have to be deaths? If this is a fantasy, why do the good people have to suffer? Why not just knock off all the Slytherins and be done with it? Yes, it's a fantasy, but it's not Snow White and the Seven Dwarves! J.K. Rowling is writing an epic fantasy on the same scale as The Lord of the Rings. Just like what happened in J.R.R. Tolkien's "Middle Earth," Harry's world has atrocities and death, and people having to make sacrifices in order to prevail over the evil that is threatening them. J.K. Rowling explains: If you're choosing to write about evil, you really do have a moral obligation to show what that means.(3) Of course, one cannot adequately portray evil if there is no real fear, threat, or pain inflicted. Unless we are personally affronted by the evil she has presented, it won't be terrible enough to affect us. Many of us are already a bit jaded from seeing movie and video deaths throughout our lives. Those who have been victims in a vicious war may be able to feel real emotion, but what if we have never experienced the horrors of arbitrary violence first-hand? How do we relate? What is needed to turn the dreaded Dark Mark from just some words on a page into a symbol of fear that makes us readers shudder? Since there doesn't seem to be a boggart to substitute, it's going to have to be a character's death. J.K.R. will use our grief from that death to stimulate our feelings, so we properly abhor this evil. We need to get hurt in order to force us into the action. Therefore, she is going to make sure it is a "bad" death. J.K. Rowling's wake-up call J.K.R. found out first-hand about reader emotions when she read to her own daughter: And when the character did die, I looked at her to see if she was O.K., and she went, "Oh, it's not Harry." She didn't give a damn. I was almost thinking, "Is this not scary at all?"(3) If there was previously any doubt in her mind concerning her plan to kill off a favorite character, that took care of it. J.K.R. can now see it is the only way to make sure she has our attention. So, we're anticipating a big scare. (gulp!) The war against Evil We are going to hate to see someone die, but J.K.R. wants us mentally prepared to fight evil. Since that death will most likely result from some form of bigotry or misguided self-righteousness, it will allow us to feel the indignance of intolerance, and to emotionally stand up against the indecencies that one human does to another. ...bigotry is probably the thing I detest most. All forms of intolerance, the whole idea of "that which is different from me is necessarily evil."(4) As part of that, we are to understand that every human and every human life is important and deserves respect. By experiencing great pain from a death, she is able to deliver the message that life is not a reset button on a video screen. If it follows that theme, this death will make it clear that the wizards are fighting an evil enemy whose battlefield is psychological as well as physical. It is a lot like the M.A.S.H. TV series, in that J.K.R.'s uninvited war invades the lives of the characters, and they are forced to make difficult choices. J.K.R. is writing a similar kind of social commentary, where she mixes life and death situations with humor, as she addresses concerns about personal injustices, social responsibilities, and prejudices. Even M.A.S.H. understood that in order for the viewer to truly relate to the pain of war, their audience had to personally experience death. Otherwise, they were just a silly sitcom. So You Understand... This is not going to be a fun romp of wizards zapping each-other. When J.K.R.'s characters go to fight this evil wizard, she wants us involved emotionally. She needs us to have a cause (a slain comrade) that touches us as readers, so we can be fighting that evil side-by-side with her characters... or it will be just a superficial children's fairy tale. That is why J.K.R. will kill off one of our beloved characters. But if it really bothers you -- unlike real life, you can just close the book.... 1 CBC News World 2 CBBC Newsround 3 Time Magazine, October 30, 2000. Visit the Time Magazine U.S. Website 4 The Leaky Cauldron / Entertainment Weekly September 7, 2000

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