TBAY: Another Snape/Lily Person!

[bluesqueak]

No: HPFGUIDX 42110

The good ship LOLLIPOPS (Love of Lily Left Ire Polluting 
Our Poor Severus) rides at anchor on the bay. Amanda 
has just finished welcoming Olivia to the ship, Offering
 her an outside cabin. Pippin is on the deck, in vampire
 mode,and Darrin and Pip!Squeak are relaxing in deckchairs.

Amanda comments

"Anyway, for all you people who've ever said "eeeurgh!
 Snape and Lily! Bleah!Greasy hair! Liked curses! Had
 she no taste??? I just can't *see* themtogether!" etc.
----> Neither Can I. I don't think anything intimate at all
went on, other than Snape going out on a limb and baring
a bit of his soulto her. And I think she was probably gracious
 enough to let him down as easily as that sort of man (boy) 
can be. No kissing. No bushes. Just love."

Pippin replied, "I can see your point, but what if Lily wasn't 
always the Gryffindor Goddess everyone remembers? 
She could have gone through one of those awkward ugly 
duckling phases. Lots of girls do, you know. She and Snape 
could have been very close for a while. Then, you know how 
it is, one September Lily comes back and the braces have gone,
 the awkwardness is just a memory, the spots have cleared up
...whatever. The Gryffindor boys who've been ignoring her take
 notice. It occurs to Lily that life has more to offer than Severus 
Snape.

"Wait a moment", Pip!Squeak says. "We all tend to see Snape 
at school as a junior version of Professor Snape - encouraged 
by Sirius's description of him in GoF as a 'slimy, oily, greasy 
haired kid' [GoF p.460, UK hardback].But Sirius Black isn't 
exactly the world's most unbiased witness where Snape's 
concerned (as I pointed out in post #42459). We don't really know 
what Snape was like at school.  As a MAGIC DISHWASHER
adherent I think that we don't really know what Snape is like 
at all, apart from those rare glimpses when he thinks Harry 
isn't watching him."

"Yeah, well," says Darrin, "OK, if Snape-Lily must be, allow 
me to cast my vote with the unrequited love theory rather than 
any kind of love triangle where Lily chose James over Snape. 
As Amanda point's out, it's not really a tough choice, is it?"

"But that's another assumption." says Pip!Squeak."Face it, 
a large proportion of the adult female readership of HP find
 themselves strangely attracted to Snape. Why couldn't Lily 
have been attracted to him? She went for the short, scruffy 
haired,glasses wearing James over the good looking Sirius, 
so she could probably see beyond whether someone was 
good looking or not.

And if she looked beyond the greasy hair: Snape's brave 
[he faces down Sirius in the Shack in PoA Chapter 19; 
he argued with Quirrel, he spied on Voldemort, which is 
pretty high on the 'get found out and you'll live exactly
as long as it's fun to torture you' stakes].  He's intelligent 
enough to design the logic puzzle in PS/SS . He's 
perceptive - look at the number of scenes where he 
guesses correctly that Harry's there in his cloak (Egg and 
the Eye in GoF, for one).Oh, and he's witty."

[ Memo to budding writers - if you wish to create a genuinely 
unpopular character, never have him showing a witty and poetic 
nature in his first big scene (PS/SS p.102 UK paperback). 
Readers of novels are generally people who love language. 
A significant section of them will find anyone who plays with 
language the way Snape does to be VERY attractive.

After such an introduction a character's tendency to mentally 
torture small children and to think that washing greasy hair once 
a week is perfectly adequate will be brushed aside as just 
minor foibles.]

Snape's sarcasm,if carried back into a more innocent time, could 
well have been very funny -somehow you can imagine the child 
Snape being the kid who makes genuinely witty comments about 
the teachers (Imaginary SnapeComment: Professor Binns teaches 
history about dead and gone people.He's dead, but has anyone told 
him he's supposed to be gone?)"

Darrin, Pippin and Amanda all look doubtfully at Pip!Squeak.  Finally 
Darrin voices what they all seem to be feeling.

"Are you trying to say that Student!Snape was the *Class Clown*!"

There is a thoughtful pause while all four contemplate this vision. 
Then Pip!Squeak shakes her head. 

"No. No, I don't think even I can manage that one.  But you can 
imagine him making the same sort of sarcastic comments about 
the teachers that he now makes about the students. Which people 
might well have admired.

There's some evidence of that in canon - Professor McGonagall 
seems to have a teasing relationship with him about the 
Gryffindor/Slytherin rivalry; the other teachers support 
Snape when he attacks Lockhart in CoS (pp. 217 - 218 
UK paperback)


"Hmm..."says Amanda. "For the record, my own personal theory
 is that Snape did indeed love Lily. That said, I don't for a minute 
think they were *ever* an "item," or were ever "involved." I think 
he either simply loved her and never said anything (I *said* I was 
a romantic, so sue me), or he did tell her and she let him down easy. 
I tend to favor the latter--it would add fuel to his hatred of James 
(which I think was already in place) when James *did*
win her. I think Snape is the sort to sublimate, and would do just 
that, sublimating all the negative emotions of rejection off onto 
James, leaving Lily still as someone loved (albeit unattainable)."

Pip!Squeak shrugged. "I agree; I don't think Lily ever was in love 
with Snape, - but is there any real reason she couldn't have been 
friendly with him? 
We're reading things back into the past that might not be the case - 
assuming that the Maurauders - Snape rivalry was a 
Slytherin/Griffyndor thing; assuming that no Gryffindors were 
friendly with any Slytherins - and there is no actual canon to 
support that. I think it is extremely significant that while
JKR has spent two whole books dealing with James's 
friends, she has told us absolutely nothing about Lily's friends. 
Why is NO ONE mentioning who Lily liked at school? 

Because Harry's godfather isn't going to mention it - 
it's embarrassing to explain that you came close to accidentally 
killing the friend of your godson's mother,or that you still have an 
intense dislike of someone that Lily liked and trusted. 

McGonagall isn't likely to mention it - she's Dumbledore's
 right hand person; if, as DISHWASHER posits(post #39273) 
Snape's apparent hatred of Harry is a cover story then she's 
not going to risk Harry asking awkward questions along the 
lines of 'if my mother liked him,  is he as bad as he seems?'.

And Snape himself is most definitely not mentioning it.  
What canon says is a negative - Snape never ever mentions Lily 
(at least, I can't remember a time when he does.) 
This is probably the reasoning behind LOLLIPOPS. Other 
characters who knew both Harry's parents refer to *both* of 
them in a natural, casual manner.
Lupin "Your parents gave their lives to keep you alive..." [POA 
p.213, UK hardback]. 

Snape significantly always refers to Harry's *father* and 
never mentions his mother. If he regarded her as beneath
 his notice, you'd think he would have used it against Harry 
('the famous Harry Potter; whose mother, of course, was a 
complete nonentity'). But he doesn't. He says nothing about 
Lily at all, never mentions that Harry *had* a mother - and 
the LOLLIPOPS have picked up on this, and concluded that 
Snape never mentions Lily because it is simply too painful."

"Yeah,"says Darrin, "but that's the whole problem for me. 
I dislike the Snape-Lily thing because of the inherent soap-
operaish quality, not because of any objection to Snape, but 
I do agree it makes sense."

"Does it have to have a soap-operaish quality?" says 
Pip!Squeak. "Give you an example. One of the few things 
we know about Lily is that the wand that picked her was good 
for charm work [PS/SS p. 63] - and Snape, judging by his 
comments on 'foolish wand waving', didn't find charms his 
favourite subject.[Though as I pointed out in post #39662 , 
he is extremely competent at 'foolish wand waving']. Did he 
and Lily have a friendship that started as a homework alliance? 
'You help me with my charms homework and I'll get you through 
potions?'

Lily and Snape as friends explains a *lot* about You Know 
What. Why James would risk his life for someone he disliked, 
why Snape was trying to get the Maurauders into trouble, why
Sirius disliked Snape so intensely... it's not soap opera if Snape 
(as Lily's old friend) was a serious contender,and they're all 
fighting
 over a girl they have a real chance of winning. It's realistic. And 
it 
solves the characterisation problem of why this unrequited love 
didn't turn into bitterness against Lily when Lily goes and marries 
the hated James. Because the underlying friendship was too 
longstanding on both sides to be destroyed."

And then, of course,"said Amanda thoughtfully, "this added fuel
to his hatred of James (which I think was already in place) when 
James *did* win her. I think Snape is the sort to sublimate, and 
would do just that, sublimating all the negative emotions of 
rejection 
off onto James, leaving Lily still as someone loved (albeit 
unattainable)."

"Look," says Darrin, "For me, what made Snape turn is one of 
the most intriguing questions in the series."

"For me, I wonder about a technical problem." said Pip!Squeak, 
grinning." How did Snape ever manage to get to Dumbledore to 
tell him he wanted to spy for him? Dumbledore was Voldemort's 
biggest enemy. Unless Snape was already a teacher at Hogwarts.." 

"He's a lousy teacher " Darrin breaks in.  "And he *hates* 
teaching - why would he pick it as a career?"

"So he probably wasn't teaching during the Voldemort years."
replied Pip!Squeak. "And any DE seen with Dumbeldore was 
going to be in big trouble. And the fallout from You Know What
suggests that Snape felt pretty resentful about Dumbledore's 
lenient treatment of Sirius Black ("Sirius Black showed he was 
capable of murder at the age of sixteen, Headmaster. You haven't 
forgotten that, Headmaster? You haven't forgotten that he
 once tried to kill me?) PoA p.286.  

So going to Dumbledore has certain problems. Being seen with 
him is dangerous, and Snape has little real reason to trust him. 
He can't go to his old Slytherin friends, because nearly all of them 
are Death Eaters (and the Death Eaters Anonymous meetings 
means he can't be completely certain who is and who isn't a DE).

Lily as an old friend, however....

Lily is muggle born. She's unlikely in the extreme to be a Death 
Eater. The Death Eater's haven't gone public at this point, and if 
Snape meets someone he's known to have been friends with at 
school, (in Diagon Alley, say) nobody's going to think twice if he 
has a short chat with her.

He could even set up a discreet private meeting with her. If 
someone finds out, well,  Voldemort doesn't seem to think 
much of women anyway.

Pippin snorts. "And did he have a plan B? According to you, 
*everyone* has a plan B."

Pip!Squeak grins evilly. "Well, in real desperation, Snape 
could always tell Voldemort he and Lily were having a little 
affair.

And if he did then pour out his heart to her, tell her that he
was in it up to his neck with the DE's and wanted out, out OUT - 
and then instead of screaming in horror, or calling the aurors 
Lily tells him that she's working for Dumbledore and if he really
wants to fight Voldemort she could find a way for him to do it...
if it was LILY who had gone to Dumbledore and persuaded him 
to trust Snape and take him on as a spy ...

It moves it away from Snape being still not over an unrequited 
teenage love affair. Instead He's still not over someone who 
he owed his - well, not his life, exactly, but his self respect. 
If he's got a place fighting on the side of the good guys then 
it was Lily who got him that chance at redemption. And she's dead. 
Not some imaginary love affair that took place in his
 head, but a real memory of a real friend, who he probably did love."

Amanda nods thoughtfully. " According to my personal theory, 
Snape *was* the spy who tipped off Dumbledore and the 
Potters that Voldemort was after them. I also think that
Voldemort knew that Snape might like it if Lily survived; 
I think Snape is the sort of personality that *would* have 
asked Voldemort for her, to save her at least, of all of them 
(sort of the way the captain of the boat tried to save Indy's 
girlfriend in Raiders of the Lost Ark? speaking Voldemort's
language, asking for her as a reward or something...). This, 
to me, is a good reason that Snape may be the DeathEater 
that Voldemort believes is gone forever, the one who will be 
killed. BecauseVoldemort knows he transgressed Snape's 
personal code and murdered someone Snape loved, and knows 
Snape well enough to know he wouldn't forgive that."

"Yes," says Darrin, "but why wouldn't he be a lot happier to 
see Harry so he can finally do something useful for Lily's 
memory? And *please* don't give me the MAGIC
DISHWASHER 'it's all an act by Snape' answer." 

"Well, whether it's an act or not," said Pip!Squeak, "we do 
then have a reason for Snape to feel deeply ambivalent 
about Harry Potter. Harry is the son of both the person who 
Snape disliked and hated , and the son of the person who 
trusted him when he most needed it. And trust is important to 
Snape. He's a naturally suspicious person who finds it hard to 
trust people. That someone values him enough to trust him is 
important to him."

"I also think it's pure torture for Snape to see Harry, who looks 
so much like James, but has Lily's eyes." says Amanda." I think 
it plays havoc with his sublimation game and dredges up 
emotions he'd thought buried for years--both positive and 
negative--and is making him even more unpleasant to be 
around. He seems a logical sort, and the irrationality of his 
reactions to Harry and Harry's friends seems to be rooted in 
something deeper than simple schoolboy rivalry. There is a 
primal, blind element to it. There had to be some stronger 
emotions in there."

"I agree." says Pip!Squeak. "But not some love affair that ended 
when he was a teenager. Not some crush that he never even 
admitted. Nope, 'he loved her' is fine, but when Lily said she wanted 
to still be friends she meant it. The whole Snape/Lily thing is a lot 
deeper and longer lasting than a long lost crush."

"But," says Pippin, "I still say there is no mutual exclusion 
between Snape is a Vampire and Snape Loved Lily. "

Pip!Squeak shuffled her feet in embarrassment. 'Snape is a 
half-vampire' is a theory she could live with, except:

"Well, we've got a half-giant teacher, a werewolf ex-teacher, 
a teacher who looks suspiciously like he might be half-goblin 
[Flitwick] - if Snape's a vampire it's going to look like JKR's 
trying to tell kids that teachers aren't really human. ;-)


Pip



Magic Dishwasher - see posts 39662 for the original, 39854 for Grey 
Wolf's summary, and 40044 for the Spying Game Part 
II. But reserve a spare day for reading all the replies - there's 
over a hundred!