If this happens, then the event will have been foreshadowed in CoS.

There is another event which happened in PS which I belive is foreshadowing a future event: Ron’s sacrifice so that Harry could go on to save the Philosopher’s Stone.

I think there’s a third such event, in the PoA.

Perhaps Harry will be saved from beyond the curtain by the phoenix, the only creature which did not experience original sin and which therefore is immortal. Or is that a redux of book 2?

I’d like to get me a phoenix. They’re handy.

Or maybe Harry will step through the curtain on purpose to kill his portion of Voldemort’s soul, and Neville will stab V. in the back.

One note: the prophecy doesn’t say that someone WILL live if the other dies – just (phrased in the positive) that one CAN live if the other dies. Nothing says that one will not kill the other and die right after. It seems likely to me that they will both die.

I think we should have a contest to write the last sentence in the book, i.e. “Neville reached up to feel the slash across his forehead, evidence of the effort it took to kill Voldemort, and realized that he would remember the sacrifice of his beloved friend and the power of love each time he saw the scar.”

It’s a good argument for Harry living. How do you write a last sentence with “scar” if there’s no Harry?

The only evidence we have to go on is that Sirius fell through the veil and did not return – and although Harry’s initial reaction was disbelief, others – particularly Lupin – were certain that Sirius was dead.

So although we don’t know how or why, we seem to be being told that there is no return (at least not to life) from behind the veil – and it seems reasonable to assume that what was true for Sirius would also apply to Harry.

Henry V., who conquered the France, is sometimes reported as Harry in Shaekespeare’s plays.

There is one funny thing in play Henry V.: one of the soldiers calls the king buckbeak.

Which may actually be the point, perhaps.

Interesting theory, anyway.