Trio dynamics, *more* Animagi, STUDMUFFIN Snape

[Tabouli]

No: HPFGUIDX 37754

Penny (quoting Petra Pan):
>>I read each instance of Hermione's jealous reaction to Ron goggling at other 
girls / women / veelas, I thought "Aww...isn't that sweet...they both 
like each other <<
> As best I recall, Ron only oogles Fleur specifically (and, like Harry, the veela in general at the Quidditch World Cup, although in the case of the QWC, Hermione pulls *Harry* down to his chair & seems exasperated with *him* & not *Ron*)<

You know, I suspect in this case that Hermione expects... *better* from Harry.  In fact, as I ranted once long ago, both Hermione and Ron seem to feel a bit out of their depth with Harry, a little awed by the enormity of what he has had to deal with compared with their own (safely adolescent) problems.  Hermione bickers with and mothers Ron, but treats Harry more like an equal, or even superior.  Certainly as an independent person whom she does not feel she has a right to tell what to do.  Remember the interesting little illustration of group dynamics in PoA Chapter 10, in Honeydukes?

Hermione says *to Ron*: "Look, Harry still shouldn't be coming into Hogsmeade, he hasn't got a signed form!" (etc.), then a little later, Harry says to Hermione, *grinning*, "Are you going to report me?"

Can't help feeling that if *Ron* was the transgressor here Hermione would have had no qualms about letting 'im have it directly, none of these worried exchanges with a third party.  And that grin of Harry's clearly shows he's confident she won't report him.


Rohit:
> After reading about the suggestion of a romantic tryst
between Krum and Hermione in their partially
transfigured animal forms all i have to say is, "Eww,
a cat and a SHARK???"  Talk about something being
"violently wrong." :P<

Pity we don't, so far, have an Animagus couple on board, where we could check out this theory.  Our only female Animagus so far is a beetle, and that doesn't seem promising for Shipping.  The only male Animagus of anywhere near compatible size is, er, Wormtail.  Ew.  Although, we could have a little worm/beetle creepy crawly invertebrate bonding there.  Unless of course you go for the Dumbledore as bumblebee Animagus option.

Hmmm... that makes me muse on something.

Now, the fact that Snape is so frequently described as bat-like has many a member frothing at the bit and declaring him a vampire.  However, there is a notable lack of froth regarding another character who is regularly described as insect-like.  Thin, green-sequinned, with bulbous eyes and a *winged* armchair...  could the Sultry Sybill be a *dragonfly Animagus*??  Is *this* the scurrilous Skeeterish scheme she uses to get information to improve her hit rate between genuine visitations from fate?

Roll up, roll up for S.T.A.F.F. B.A.N.D.A.I.D. (Sybill Trelawney, A Fortune-telling Fraud But A Nifty Dragonfly Animagus In Disguise)...

Cindy:
> Actually, there's reason to believe that Trelawney has had a romantic 
interest in the past.  See, I think Trelawney has been pursuing Snape 
lately, perhaps hoping to re-kindle what they once shared.<

My, for a greasy-haired, sullen, sallow crank, Snape certainly pulls the chicks.
>Indeed, the moment that Dumbledore seats Trelawney between Snape and 
McGonagall, McGonagall becomes waspish with Trelawney.  During 
Christmas dinner, no less. Snape, on the other hand, doesn't converse 
with either McGonagall or Trelawney for the rest of the dinner
>
>Could it be that McGonagall dislikes Trelawney not because McGonagall 
dislikes Divination, but because she doesn't approve of Trelawney's 
sly efforts to lure Snape to the North Tower?<

Hey, why stop at Trelawney?  Why not make the waspishness (another insect reference!) of Minerva stem from Minerva's *own* unrequited passion for Snape?  All that bickering about Quidditch, tsk tsk.  Flirtation, that's what it is.  And note how practically *all* the other staff, except Dumbledore and Filch (see Kitty-Gro FLIRTIAC on the latter), shun Snape for his womanising ways.  No wonder he's surly.  Then again, perhaps the surliness is a mere pose, assumed because it turns him from greasy sallow sulker to brooding, mysterious, eloquent chick magnet!  Treat 'em mean, keep 'em keen!

Cindy:
> the central premise of LOLLIPOPS, as we all know, is that Snape loved Lily.  But where is 
it written that Snape is a one-witch man?  I haven't seen a thing in 
the LOLLIPOPS backstory or canon that means that Snape loved Lily to 
the exclusion of Sibyll.  I think he loved Lily (which explains his 
dislike of Harry), but he loved Trelawney, too.  There was more than 
enough Severus to go around for all the witches, I think. <

Still imprisoned in the bowels of the Good Ship LOLLIPOPS, Captain Tabouli's brow develops a scowl, which she hastily smooths out, reminding herself of her inclusivity policy.  She herself favours Snape as a one-witch man, because it makes the tragedy of losing his one witch, first to James, and then to Voldemort, all the more poignant and angst-ridden.  Lily as lost jewel of the harem just lacks that certain... Edge.  However, given that she gave a bigamy berth to Rita and whipped her up an E.L.F.T.A.B.B.Y. (Enough Love For Two!  Alliance for Benevolent Bigamist Yearnings) badge, she reluctantly concludes that she cannot subsequently discriminate against Snape the sex god surrounded by groupies.  The Captain wearily redirects Cindy down to the corridor she has now dubbed "The Tunnel of Love" over the PA system, and organises for a new badge, which declares Snape a S.T.U.D.M.U.F.F.I.N. (Snape, The Ultimate Dreamboat, Makes Uncountable Females Favour Immediate Nuptials).

Elfundeb:
> Snape (...) is too smart not to have realized very quickly that participating in pointless Muggle killings isn't 
any kind of control worth having.   No wonder he became disillusioned with the DE's. <
>
>What amazes me, though,  is how he could ever have been persuaded to join 
them in the first place.  Could he not have known what it would be like, that 
their only purpose was to serve Voldemort?  Did Voldemort lure him with false 
promises?   Though I hold to the idea that it was general disillusionment 
with the 'good' side's apparent failure to adhere to principles that pushed 
him in the direction his Slytherin gang was heading (still confused as to the 
name of this theory), it must have taken an enormous amount of 
disillusionment - way more than the Prank could offer, or L.O.L.L.I.P.O.P.S., 
or both. <

Ah, but the mega-version of LOLLIPOPS links all of these (see my 6th November post, "Severus Snape: The Grudge and the very long LOLLIPOPS biography).  Snape was bitter and mistrustful right from the day he started Hogwarts knowing more curses than half the seventh years.  Makes him a pretty good candidate for the Dark Side from the age of 11, don't you think?  *Then*, he gets sorted into the widely maligned Slytherin, *and* spends his adolescence with a crowd of Voldemort sympathising peers at an age where one would imagine the attitudes of his peers would be having maximum influence over him.  *And* the leader of the "good side", Dumbledore, makes Snape's arch-enemy James Potter a Quidditch star and Head Boy.

Frankly, I'm not suprised he went over to Voldemort.  All the indicators are there.  He was 17, he was angry, he was in Slytherin, he had reason to resent the good side, he bore grudges, he studied curses, all his friends did it.

What's more surprising is that he appeared to devote a lot of his life snooping about trying to smear the Marauders (James, Remus, Sirius, Peter), to the extent that Sirius is so irritated that he snaps and tells him to check out the tunnel to the Shrieking Shack.  Why??

Dumbledore compares the situation with the loathing between Harry and Draco.  OK, so Draco tries to get Harry into trouble, and succeeds.  Why?  It appears to be personal, as much as anything: Draco tried to curry favour with the high-status, famous Harry Potter and was rebuffed rudely in favour of a lowlife Weasley.  The impudence!  Then, Draco teases Harry's fellow Gryffindor Neville and Harry successfully nabs the Remembrall back... and then gets made Seeker on the strength of it.  Shame and envy.  Isn't it likely that Snape's loathing of James also had a personal basis?

Now, I can't see suspicious, curse-happy 11yo Snape trying to make friends with James Potter and getting rebuffed.  Hardly.  And yes, James becomes a Quidditch star, but unless there's a lot more to it this is hardly a personal affront to Severus.  Lots of people from enemy houses get onto Quidditch teams... why pick out James for particular resentment?  Which leaves us with shame and envy.  Sure, on the information we currently have, there could have been all sorts of things about James Snape envied, or situations in which Snape was shamed at James' hands.  However, given that being a sports star is widely believed to attract girls (?), and Snape was an oily, sullen and probably unattractive loser, not to mention Snape's immediate, unaccountable hatred for Harry before he even opens his mouth, and Hagrid's inside knowledge that there was *definitely* more to the James/Snape scenario than he could tell 11yo Harry...

...I'd say there's a good chance that the thing James had which Snape envied, and for which Snape plunged himself into a shame so intense he spent the rest of his schooldays trying to avenge it, was Lily.

AV:
> Now we're probably not going to read about Snape's kitten in book 5, 
alas. Any theories on where this kitten came from? Just wandered in? 
Innocent child of a torrid, illicit alliance perhaps involving Mrs. 
Norris? (Or McGonagall even, but I think Mrs. Norris is more likely).<

You mean, the irritating yet adorable love-child/kitten of a tryst between *Snape* and Mrs Norris?  Cor.  O' course, it could just be that Mrs Norris gave Snape custody of her illegitimate child, but why?  Could Filch have begged Snape, his only friend and a proper, powerful wizard, to transfigure briefly into cat form and seduce her on his behalf (from Filch with love?), resulting in his fair feline daughter?  (I think we have another candidate for the EW series here...)

Cor.  There's no stopping this Snape Studmuffin, is there?  Mark this one with an A.U.T.U.M.N. A.S.T.E.R.I.S.K. (An Unauthorised Tranfiguration Unites Mrs Norris And Snape, The Eventual Result Is Sassy Kitten)...

After issuing this acronym, the MAGIC machine chugs to a gentle halt, and Captain Tabouli falls silent.  Eight days now she has been locked in her cabin, fed only with acronym requests and occasional glimpses of news through the porthole.  Just when she has abandoned all hope, and is sadly reaching for the glass-cutter to grind her way to freedom, she hears footsteps outside in the corridor, and a faint click at the door.  Hardly daring to hope, she tiptoes to the door and turns the handle.  To her amazement and delight, it opens, deluging her in a flood of 460 HPFGU posts...

Tabouli of the finally fixed email account.


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