[HPforGrownups] Re: Snape's DE past/ Life Debts

[Carol Bainbridge]

No: HPFGUIDX 44499

Risti" <kristin at j...> wrote:
> > Well, this is somewhat unrelated, but still related
> > to Snape's deatheater past, and the Life Debts
> > theories circling around.  I've always wondered
> > something.  Why didn't Snape kill James Potter?  We
> > know he was a death eater at one point-I would
> > imagine a through and through death eater as well,
> > no matter what his redemption was later on.  We know
> > that he hated James Potter.  Arthur Weasley said
> > that the DE's killed for fun, and what would be more
> > fun for Snape then to out his old enemy?  This is
> > early on, before any secret keeper, or even any
> > Harry.  The only reason I can come up with is
> > this:James Potter once saved Snape's life....

Barb replied:
>Also, I don't believe we know enough about why Snape became a Death Eater; 
>there is really no indication that Snape would cold-bloodedly murder 
>someone, so expecting him to murder James if James had not saved his life 
>at one time seems rather odd to me.

Except that if DE's killed for fun, there wouldn't need to be any other 
motive.  It is logical to assume that if Snape was a DE and DE's killed for 
fun, Snape would also kill for fun.  Not that I believe this of Snape, mind 
you.  In fact, I happen to think that Snape is a more honorable character 
than that, and that this trait has something to do with why he left the DE's.

Barb continued:
>Aside from Snape having been a Slytherin in school and probably having 
>many Slytherin acquaintances who probably did the same thing, we just 
>don't know what pushed him into the DEs.  The trouble with this dubious 
>"reason" is that Snape has not been portrayed by JKR as someone to just go 
>sheep-like along with the crowd.  He's exactly the sort of parent, IMO, 
>who would say to a child, "So!  You became a Death Eater because all of 
>your friends did it!  If all of your friends chopped off their right 
>hands, would you do it too?"

I would agree with this.  Snape does not appear to be a follower at 
all.  However, I assume he was in Slytherin, since he is now head of that 
house.  A characteristic of the Slytherins is that they will use any means 
to achieve their end.  I think it is quite likely that Snape became a DE in 
order to get something he wanted.  It may have seemed like a good thing to 
do at the time, but I'm sure he decided once in it, that it wasn't such a 
good idea after all.  It may even be that once a DE, he discovered that the 
Potters were marked for extinction and that drove him out of Voldemort's 
camp.  I'm beginning to believe more and more in a Snape/Evans connection, 
and it could be that as a result of this connection, Snape felt honor-bound 
to report what he learned about the Potter conspiracy to Dumbledore.  We 
know someone alerted Dumbledore, and I think it's quite likely that someone 
was Snape.  To stretch things even further, it is, IMO, likely that 
Voldemort had asked Snape to eliminate the Potters because of his 
relationship to them.  Perhaps Voldie thought that Snape could get close 
enough to the Potters to do them in before they suspected him of any evil 
intentions.  If Snape not only refused to perform this deed, but also 
reported it to Dumbledore, he would certainly have put himself at great 
personal risk, which is exactly what Dumbledore says of Snape.


Carol Bainbridge
(kaityf at jorsm.com)

http://www.lcag.org