Harry Potter - Harry: Hero or Heroism?

As the sorting hat once told him, "And a nice thirst to prove yourself, now that's interesting... You could be great, you know - it's all here in your head..." So Harry wants to prove himself. And he's got plenty to prove - he's more than just a famous face, more than just a name in the newspaper every now and then, more than just a kid who lucked out and saved the wizarding world from one of the greatest evils ever known. To Harry, being famous is a curse and a blessing. On one hand, he's got a ready supply of friends and admirers, who may or may not be true to him - and on the other hand there are many who are quick to hate him. Like Draco Malfoy for instance, whose jealousy and vindictiveness causes Harry grief on several occassions. Being in the spotlight all the time places pressures on Harry to perform, to assert his own existence in relation to what the masses believe of him. Is he a hero? Undoubtedly. Will he risk his neck to save others? In a second.

Yet, despite Harry's constant efforts, the wizarding mass media still antagonizes him, especially in OoTP. He's painted as a lying, cheating, delusional fame seeker in the Daily Prophet, which only pains him further. I'm not trying to say Harry wants to prove to everyone how great he is. Maybe, on some deep subconscious level, he does - wouldn't we all love to be recognized and revered? - but Harry does what he believes is right, out of his own moral volition, more than to be rewarded by the press. He's more interested in satisfying his own need to prove who he is to himself, and ultimately, through that to everyone else.

Even so, there is nothing that can take away those ten years of mistreatment and victimisation. It should come as no surprise, then, that he would be eager to shed the skin of a 'victim' and become a hero instead. Saving others in times of danger gives Harry a much more powerful sense of satisfaction than anything else can even come close to. He has the need to be a defender, to be a saviour, in order to defend what he has because losing it all again, after finally acquiring friends (the Weasleys), a home (Hogwarts) and a better prospect in life, would be unbearable. In a sense, with every person he saves, Harry is saving himself.

In CoS, Harry risks his life to save Ginny from the Chamber - the H/G shipper in me would love to say this is because he's secretly attracted to Ginny, but it's more likely to be due to his desire to save others that motivated him. From the very start, Ginny has been depicted as small, harmless, by all accounts a sweet little girl who has a crush on Harry. As such, she's the perfect victim and Harry is obliged to save her - his "hero complex" demands it.

Look at it like this: We all shape our view of ourselves based on the opinions of others. That is, we confirm who we by looking at how we are related to someone else. Harry is a hero because he opposes Voldemort, who is an evil bastard because he tries to repeatedly kill Harry and just about everyone else. If Voldemort never existed, would Harry still be a hero? Maybe. He has the makings of your standard hero - courage, valour, a sense of adventure - but certainly not to the extent of what he is now.

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