Character Under Pressure

In all the books, Harry is a hero because he is able to dig deep into his sources of courage, wit and physical strength when he needs to. It is obvious that he is not a natural hero, nor is he fully comfortable with his fame. He knows that to some his fame is notoriety, and J K Rowling has done well to remind readers and viewers in the celebrity age of the difference between the two.

From his first confrontation with Voldemort in The Philosopher's Stone to his final destruction of him in The Deathly Hallows, Harry's efforts against Voldemort have been as much on behalf of his friends as in revenge for the death of his parents. While he has not tempered his actions - the stabbing of Tom Riddle's diary with the basilisk tooth was at once inspired and murderously violent - he is not given to blind, vengeful furies. His thoughts leading up to his actions are often impulsive and the product of rage, but when it comes to the crunch, he acts with a clearer vision.

In The Prisoner of Azkaban, we see Harry's more considered - if ultimately ineffective - treatment of Peter Pettigrew, insisting that he be handed over for trial and shipment to Azkaban, rather than being vapourised in the Screaming Shack.

Like all people with talent - whether musical, sporting, dramatic, literary or whatever - Harry, too, has his own favourite moves. That Voldemort hasn't learned this is a result of his own hubris. In the final confrontation, Voldemort is truly at bay. He is facing a Harry Potter that he believes to have killed already. His loyal aids are dead, including his favourite, Bellatrix Lestrange. Voldemort is, much like Macbeth, taking his last desperate throw, using all his remaining strength.

Harry, however, has passed to a new plane where he is no longer afraid of death, having faced it. There is nothing more Voldemort can do to him, and he knows it. His knowledge of the prophecy, and his awareness of the nature of the transference of the Elder Wand, gives him the serenity of mind to realise that all that is necessary in the final exchange is his own, tried and proven, spell, Expelliarmus!.

It is enough to defeat Voldemort. Harry has proved he not a killer, but one who uses his wits as well as his magical abilities. He has not been corrupted by his experiences, and this is why his friends, Hermione, Neville, Luna, all the Weasleys, and others have remained loyal to him.