Severus Snape: The grudge and the very long LOLLIPOPS biography...

[Alex]

No: HPFGUIDX 28785

I think this is the only possible explanation that would make snape a 
believable character. Otherwise, he's just a sadistic teacher who 
hates the students and picks victims to torture, a vengeful, hateful, 
cruel man, a former murderous death eater, but now reformed and 
really good at heart, underneath that seething, rage filled shell?
Give me a break. Thats a pretty poor character, unless we have 
justification for all of this, unless its all tied together by a 
perfect explanation, such as L.O.L.L.I.P.O.P.S.
Alex
92% obsessed.
"I love the smell of napalm in the morning"

"You don't hear no a lot, do you?
Yeah, but it's more like 'No, please, No'"

> As captain of LOLLIPOPS I have to step in here.  Look, I'm not 
denying any of the above when I say I think Snape loved Lily.  I 
think you've made a good point, particularly about turning to the 
Dark Side in the first place.  I'm not saying Lily was the only 
reason, but I reckon she could have been an important catalyst in 
both directions.  My best evidence is observation of Snape's grudge.  
That grudge of is just a mite too strong, irrational and generation-
crossing to be based on Quidditch alone, *especially* from an 
intelligent man whose does, deep down, have that sense of integrity.  
JKR herself has hinted that there's more to it than that through 
Hagrid, we just don't know what the other factor or factors are.
> 
> OK, let me test out the gleaming, unused artillery of the Good Ship 
LOLLIPOPS and flesh out my case.  (Apologies to those who've heard my 
spiel hundreds of times before!)
> 
> What did the newly arrived, 11yo Harry ever do to Snape to make him 
hate him so much?  Snape was glaring at him with dislike the *minute* 
he laid eyes on him at the Sorting Ceremony, and started picking on 
him as soon as he walked into the first Potions class.
> 
> At this point, Harry hasn't done *anything* to Snape.  He hasn't 
broken any rules and got away with it like his father, he hasn't 
stolen from Snape's stores, he hasn't started playing Quidditch.  He 
has, of course, defeated Voldemort and accidentally achieved fame and 
a scar, but Snape hasn't yet had any evidence of Harry trading on 
this fame.  In fact, in concrete terms, Harry hasn't really had a lot 
of direct personal benefits as a result of ousting Voldemort - he 
indirectly helped the Wizarding World a lot, but in the process lost 
both parents and grew up in a horrible family who don't like or want 
him.  He didn't get anything out of it that Snape would have wanted, 
surely (with the possible exception of fame, but Snape doesn't seem 
the type to be motivated by fame to me - he obviously doesn't care 
that much whether people like and admire him from his behaviour.  
Fudge's idea that the loss of the Order of Merlin hit him hard 
strikes me as something Fudge would identify with, not Snape).
> 
> Surely Snape, who is close to Dumbledore, would know as well as 
anyone in the wizarding world that Harry has been raised in the 
Muggle world, where he isn't famous and gets no special treatment.  
Even as term progresses, Snape would be hard put to find any real 
evidence that Harry is using his fame to get attention (quite the 
reverse), especially compared with someone like Lockhart.  Snape's 
interpretation of Harry's behaviour is highly coloured, malicious and 
irrational.  Why is this?
> 
> The only reason we have thus far is that Snape hated Harry's father 
James.  So OK, given how much Harry looks like James, one could argue 
that he brings back all Snape's jealousy, and Snape projects all 
James' behaviour onto James' son in the absence of any evidence that 
Harry is anything like his father in anything but looks.  Well, 
maybe, but surely an intelligent man with a sense of professionalism 
and integrity would see how irrational this is, and how 
UNprofessional and unproductive it is to persecute a student in his 
class from Day 1 without any other reason.  Sure, he might like to 
pick victims.  Sure, he might look for reasons to hassle Harry.  
Sure, he might take the slightest evidence that Harry is acting like 
James and blow it out of proportion, as he does.  But why *such* an 
extreme, irrational reaction to a student who seems at least average 
at his subject (unlike Neville), and does not go out of his way to 
draw attention to himself (unlike Hermione), or constantly get caught 
playing tricks and practical jokes (unlike the twins)?
> 
> Now, what sort of emotion regularly evokes extremely irrational 
behaviour?  If intense enough, jealousy of James's achievements 
might, at a pinch, but James has already died a horrible death.  It 
seems a bit much to be unable to control directing hatred of James 
for his achievements down a generation onto James' 11yo son (and even 
his friends), who hasn't yet achieved anything or done anything to 
him.  On the other hand, sexual jealousy drives people to extremely 
irrational behaviour all the time, and there is a very good reason 
why it could be transmitted to James' son... because James' son is 
also the son of the woman Snape loved, who died to save his life.
> 
> Put a crush on Lily into the equation, and Snape's behaviour makes 
much more sense.  He lays eyes on 11yo Harry at the Sorting, and what 
does he see?  Someone who looks almost exactly like the man who 
outclassed him in Quidditch, was popular, attractive, brilliant, 
elected as Head Boy and saved him life under humiliating and 
terrifying circumstances.  This would be bad enough.  But for to see 
Lily's eyes in the face of James' son, Lily whom he'd loved 
desperately for years, Lily who chose James over him, Lily who died 
to save this boy, would be agony.  All the pain, all the jealousy, 
all the grief would come back, pushing Snape over the edge and 
filling him with a desire to torture this boy as much as he can get 
away with to punish him for what he symbolises.  Every success Harry 
has, ever rule he breaks, rubs in James' victory and Lily's death 
even more.  He wants to torture Harry, prove him evil, get him 
expelled from the school so he need never be reminded again.
> 
> Makes a lot of sense to me.
> 
> There even a tiny hint from JKR in a chat I once read (no, no idea 
which one, though no doubt someone will be able to say).  I think she 
was was asking for questions from an audience and someone asked if 
Snape would fall in love.  JKR laughed and asked what made him/her 
think of that, and said it was an interesting idea and s/he would 
find out why later.  Or something like that which suggested there 
might in fact be something in it.  OK, a minimal hint, but JKR is 
always so careful you have to wonder...
> 
> As for the link with turning to the Dark Side, I admit my evidence 
is weaker, but let me weave how it might all have happened, based on 
what we know about the train of events, Lily, MWPP and Snape.
> 
> SEVERUS SNAPE
> 
> A Highly Biased and Subjective Biography from the Crew of 
L.O.L.L.I.P.O.P.S., loosely based on Canon Evidence
> 
> In 1983 Severus Snape and MWPP start at Hogwarts.  Severus is a 
clever, inquisitive, ambitious young boy, with a chip on his 
shoulder.  Already, at 11, his desire for revenge (perhaps on a cruel 
primary school teacher, if such things existed in the WW at the time) 
is such that he has studied more curses than a lot of the senior 
students.  From the start he is a successful student, excelling at 
Charms (into which I assume Curses fall), but never quite manages to 
beat two infuriating Gryffindors, Sirius and James, the best students 
in the year.  To add insult to injury, James becomes a Chaser on the 
Gryffindor Quidditch team in his 2nd year, and his performance 
generates a lot of attention and adulation.
> 
> In their third and fourth years, Gryffindor and Slytherin have 
Potions classes together.  Although rivalry is seething between MWPP 
and Severus' gang of Slytherins, Severus can't help noticing one of 
James' greatest fans is a young redhead called Lily Evans, who has 
often vied with him for top student in Charms.  She tries to make 
peace between the warring houses, and treats him with far more 
respect and reason than her fellow Gryffindors.  Watching her 
admiration for his rival, he is increasingly taken with her good 
looks, kindness and talent at Charms (his own best subject).  Though 
he considers the weedy, bespectacled James no prize, he is painfully 
aware that he is no stunner himself, with his greasy skin and hair, 
and nurses his crush in private insecurity.  Secretly, he begins to 
study Potions as hard as he can so that he can impress her.  
> 
> By fifth year his crush has swelled into an obsession.  Her 
continued admiration of James drives him insane.  Why James and not 
him?  Is it the Quidditch?  (he is useless at Quidditch)  What does 
she see in that arrogant idiot, always strutting about with that 
annoying pretty-boy Sirius Black??  He longs to wither James with 
scorn, curse him into oblivion, but as Lily is always around, he 
dares not be anything but polite to him.  (MWPP laugh at his 
unconvincing attempts to be suave and fawning around her, and think 
he is the slimiest boy in the school).  When he notices that Remus 
disappears on a monthly basis, he rejoices to himself.  Surely this 
is something suspicious, something that he can uncover which will 
prove beyond doubt to Lily that MWPP are arrogant, foolhardy and 
untrustworthy.  Whenever Lily is out of sight he taunts and harangues 
MWPP about it, until the hotheaded Sirius loses his temper and 
suggests he find out for himself.  Smug with victory and afire with 
curiousity, Severus sneaks into the tunnel beneath the Whomping 
Willow and is rescued from almost certain death by the worst person 
possible: James himself!
> 
> Severely shaken, Severus backs off for a while, but in sixth year, 
when it looks as if Lily and James are actually starting a 
*relationship* he cracks.  The time has come for desperate measures.  
He slaves at his Potions homework and begins creeping around the 
Restricted Section of the library at night looking for love potion 
recipes and trying to mix them up in remote cupboards.  Just when he 
thinks he has succeeded, he is caught by a seventh year Slytherin 
called Gilderoy, who trips over the cauldron and ends up swallowing 
half of it.  As Gilderoy gets to his feet, he catches sight of his 
own reflection in a mirror and is transfixed with adoration for it.  
Severus, terrified that Gilderoy will tell the humiliating story to 
the whole school, warns him that he will hit him with a Memory Charm 
and ten curses if he so much as thinks of it, but Gilderoy hardly 
listens.  He pulls the mirror off the wall and drifts down the 
corridor gazing at himself and murmuring so beatifically about Memory 
Charms that Severus decides not to bother.
> 
> In his last year at Hogwarts, the unthinkable happens.  Not only 
are James and Lily undoubtedly now a couple, but despite years of 
rule-breaking and joke-playing, James is made Head Boy instead of 
him!  Severus almost cries with anguish when he thinks of the time 
James and Lily spend together having cosy chats in Dumbledore's 
office.  Filled with bitterness, he withdraws from his quest 
entirely, and immerses himself in his gang of Slytherins, all of whom 
are scheming to gain power by joining the Dark Lord.  Severus no 
longer has anything to lose, and has a volcano of resentment and fury 
to unleash.  Every time they whisper of the Forbidden Curses, Severus 
imagines James, screaming and screaming as he turns Crucio on him.  
When they graduate from school, the news that James and Lily are 
engaged is the final straw.  Severus makes straight for Voldemort, 
who quickly notices his intelligence and talent with curses and 
potions, and puts him to work.
> 
> Working for Voldemort gives Severus many outlets for his rage.  For 
maybe a year or two he vents his adolescence bitterness on the 
innocent who oppose Voldemort, and shows such cunning and discretion 
that Voldemort recruits him, together with many of his former 
schoolmates, to be a Death Eater.  As he knew James so well at 
school, he is ideally placed to lead the next project - the 
elimination of the Potter line, which has been prophesised to bring 
down the Dark Lord.  Once this is done, Voldemort will destroy all 
Muggle-borns and take over the world. Severus does away with all the 
peripheral Potters, and learns that Voldemort's spy has tracked down 
James and Lily for him.  Though his initial reaction is a terrible 
glee, as Severus Apparates to Godric's Hollow, three thoughts 
simultaneously occur to him.  The first is that if he kills James, 
Lily will be single again, and he might, just might, be able to claim 
her at last.  The second is that however much he hates James, he owes 
him his life.  The third, and most frightening thought of all, is 
that even if he did manage to kill James and claim Lily, his joy 
would be very brief.  Lily is Muggle-born, and his next task could 
well be to kill her himself.
> 
> Suddenly, the rage which has blinded Severus for so many years 
begins to evaporate.  Why had he killed those innocent people he had 
killed and tortured for Voldemort?  Was it loyalty to Voldemort, 
hatred for them, or hatred for am unjust world which always seem to 
give most to those who deserved it least?  As the last of the rage 
dissipates, it is replaced by a terrible feeling of shame and self-
loathing.  If Lily knew what he has done she would hate him as much 
as he hates her husband.  The truth of it hits him like an iceberg, 
and he starts to shake all over at the thought of what he has 
become.  He knows there is only one thing left that can redeem him.  
He Apparates to the Hogwarts gates, goes straight to Dumbledore and 
breaks down completely.
> 
> Dumbledore is a compassionate man, and knows true repentance when 
he sees it.  However, accepting someone back to the Good Side after 
he has served as a Death Eater is not something to be done lightly.  
He agrees to forgive Snape and trust him on two conditions: the 
first, that he successfully deceives Voldemort into thinking that he 
is still a Death Eater and becomes a spy for Dumbledore, and the 
second, that he accepts the position of Potions Master at Hogwarts.  
Snape agrees, and returns to Voldemort, telling him that he could not 
complete his task because he was intercepted by Dumbledore, and asked 
that it be assigned to someone else, as he will now be watched.  
Voldemort is livid, but sees the logic of this, and decides to go to 
Godric's Hollow himself, where he kills James and Lily and is all but 
killed when the curse rebounds from infant Harry...
> 
> Tabouli (who got very carried away with this and has in fact fallen 
overboard...)
> 
> 
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]