[HPforGrownups] Re: Snape as teacher

[Magda Grantwich]

No: HPFGUIDX 17316

> So Snapes problem really is (apart from all the many others we
> dont know about yet) that as much as he tries not to be influenced

> by and show his own emotions, he doesnt even manage to do his 
> teaching job rather unemotionally and mechanically.


I don't think Snape knows anymore what his emotions are.  Of all the
adults in the book (and I'm including Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia),
Snape is the most child-like.  Not to be confused with childish,
although he is that occasionally too.  

His feelings are right under the surface, just like lava under the
weakening rock of a volcano's rim, and when they surge, everybody
better be out of range to avoid flying projectiles.  His bullying of
the students has always struck me as the restrained and sulky actions
of a man who knows he's not allowed to do anything REALLY bad; much
like Draco's taunts of Harry are meant to compensate for the fact
that Draco really can't do much more than annoy Harry.  A sign of
powerlessness, actually, rather than power.  

LIke a child, his likes and dislikes assume a huge significance in
his own eyes and he is totally incapable of any perspective on the
matter.  Granted that death by werewolf is probably one of the
nastier ways to check out, it was twenty years ago so give it up
already.  

Snape's concept of authority is also very child-like: do this or
you'll be punished; don't do that or you'll be expelled.  The
rolled-up newspaper theory of rewards and punishments is what makes
sense to him.  He doesn't believe that you can maintain order by
force of example (He thinks Dumbledore lets Harry get away with
everything)
or that you can appeal to a child's conscience (although he and Lupin
say pretty much the same thing in PoA after Harry gets caught being
off the grounds, he ensures that his warning has no effect by
taunting Harry and getting his back up).

Even the "swooping around like an overgrown bat" (as Quirrell put it)
is more child-like than grown-up.  He's trying to make an effect; he
thinks he does.  But Dumbledore would be an impressive figure in
London or in the MoM or wherever because of his stature.  Can anyone
even imagine Snape in a crowd of people outside of Hogwarts?  Does he
ever go anywhere there are large numbers of adults around?  He didn't
go to the Quidditch World Cup.  Does he go down to Hogsmeade
occasionally to kick back a Flaming Dragon's Blood (hold the cherry)
at the Three Broomsticks?  Does he flirt with Rosmerta?  (As if!)
Would she recognize it if he did?  Personally I don't think that
Snape has discovered girls yet; his blasting the rosebushes
activities during the Yule dance is so wonderfully in character as is
his touching belief that taking points away will deter them from
finding other bushes.

And what kind of a teacher would you have if you put a child in
charge of a class?  One that would delight in his ability to torment
people he didn't like, knowing they couldn't respond, but who would
refretfully acknowledge that there were boundaries he couldn't pass;
one who would take pleasure in other kids' also tormenting those he
didn't like and who would show his favour to those kids without any
sense that favourtism is inappropriate.

In short you would get Snape, the biggest kid at Hogwarts.



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