Harry's POV was Snape is NOT Sexy

[severin_szaltis]

No: HPFGUIDX 56508

Abigailnus:
No one suggested that the books were a first person narrative, which 
is
certainly not the only kind of narrative that allows us to see the 
world
through a particular person's eyes. 

	
SS:
And I am not suggesting that any one is suggesting that, only that 
there has been a confusion between the POV a narrator has taken and 
First Person `feeling.' 
 

Abigailnus: 
A good example of how the books are indeed told from Harry's POV is 
looking at 
Harry's misconceptions. 

SS:
I don't dispute the POV only how far we as readers can assume that a 
Harry bias is intended every time the narrator gives us a description 
of an event or character. As you say:

Abigailnus: 
Look at Snape, as long as we're talking about him. 
Harry detests him, with some justification, and has never been able 
to shake
the conviction that Snape is dangerous. And yet, whenever we see Snape
interacting with people while unaware that Harry is watching him - his
conversations with Moody and Karkaroff in GoF, for example - his 
venom level
goes down.

SS:
This we also only see because Harry is watching it.  It is still 
Harry's POV.  It doesn't matter that Snape is unaware that Harry is 
watching and we can't assume more or less `Harry bias' because of it. 

Besides, I disagree that Snape's venom level goes down, in GoF when 
Harry is stuck on the stairs invisible to Snape, Snape is described 
as speaking to Moody "coldly" and "in a soft dangerous voice."  


Abigailnus:
Coming back to Snape, and the question of whether his appearance is 
in fact as
odious as Harry perceives it to be. It may be true that Harry's 
dislike of
Snape is coloring his perception, and I would guess that this might 
have
started happening soon after the two met, but Harry's unpleasant 
descriptions
of Snape begin before Snape makes his dislike clear. 
When Harry first sees
Snape at Hogwarts, and during the first Potions lesson, he has no
preconceptions and no bias against Snape, and yet he still describes 
him as
physically unappealing. 


SS:
This is coming back to my point, it is NOT in actual fact Harry doing 
the describing it is the narrator.  Yes we have the story from 
Harry's stand point/POV, that is not the same as Harry describing 
events or the same as getting only what Harry 'feels.'


I refer you to 'A Glossary of Literary Terms' by M. H. Abrahms:

The limited point of view. The narrator tells the story in the third 
person, but stays inside the confines of what is experienced, though 
and felt by a single character
For a revealing analysis, however, of 
the way even an author who restricts the narrative centre of 
consciousness to a single character nonetheless communicates 
authorial judgements on people and events


As I said elsewhere the difference between a Limited Narrator POV and 
a First Person Narrative can at times be a subtle one, but there is a 
difference.  Harry is not doing the describing and we cannot assume a 
Harry bias with every description.

SS ~;o)