OOP:Potions master, Lucius, characterisat, Harry/Snape, Wormtail, sayings, Percy

[rane_ab]

No: HPFGUIDX 62295

Hi everyone! There are so many messages - there is no way I'm ever 
going to manage to read them all. So forgive me if I say things that 
have been mentioned before (no doubt I will; I already found that 
somebody else had replied exactly in the same fashion as I had to two 
posts I replied to earlier). But here it goes anyway.

S
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Snape tells us that he has been teaching for 14 years now - which 
means he got the post right after Voldemort got vanquished (well, I 
suppose he could have got it a month before, but it sure sounds to me 
like he's been teaching since Voldemort disappeared). I wonder, 
though, what he was doing before? I don't get the impression that 
people are full time DEs, so he must have been doing something. Was 
he getting his 'master' title for Potions? It has been discussed 
before that this was probably an academic title as it is in 
the 'Muggle' world. But then I wonder
 why was he bothering getting 
the title in first place? I mean, he says himself he applied for the 
DADA position first. So why would he study Potions? Unless, of 
course, he never planned on becoming a teacher - but then still, it 
doesn't make much sense for him to apply for the DADA position so 
fervently if he loved Potions enough to do a master in them (why 
didn't he do a master in DADA?). Just wondering.

It says, also, that Lucius Malfoy is 41. Which does definitely mean 
he was in school with Snape - but were they in the same year? As I 
recall, JKR said at some point that Snape was 35 or 36, but I have no 
idea when she said that. The only way they could have been in the 
same year is if Snape was 36 in book 1. Though I suppose I can very 
well see a younger Severus running after the elder Malfoy.

Was anyone else cheering when Malfoy finally got landed in Azkaban? I 
mean, all right, he probably won't be staying there long, but can you 
just imagine fancy Mr. Malfoy in a dank, dark cell in Azkaban? The 
mere thought sends me into a fit of laughter. What a pity the 
Dementors couldn't stay just a while longer
 :-p
And I suppose he can't exactly walk right back into Malfoy Manor now, 
everybody will no doubt be watching. (Though I don't doubt that 
Malfoy has his ways to get in without attracting attention, either.)

Someone remarked somewhere (sorry, I forgot who) that Wormtail wasn't 
in the book (except in the past). Well, there weren't many scenes 
where he could have been present, were there? It's not like he's a 
brilliant wizard - I'm not even sure if he is considered a Death 
Eater; more like Voldie's lapdog, indeed. So I doubt Voldie would let 
him participate in any attack (like the one at the MoM at the end of 
the book). The only scene where he could have been present was in 
Harry's dream about Rookwood. But, well, he would have had absolutely 
no function in the scene, would he? Even if he was present, it's 
likely he was standing *behind* Voldie and thus out of Harry's line 
of sight.


About the characters
 well, I've just got to say this. I thought it 
was really brilliant the way she showed the different layers in all 
the characters - the way she flawed the good characters, and showed 
us Snape wasn't always a big, great bully. It seems a lot of people 
were annoyed with either/both Harry's behaviour and Sirius'. But I 
loved both. Seriously. Harry's behaviour bothered me a little at the 
beginning of the book, because it seemed to have changed so abruptly. 
Of course, we're missing a month, there, IIRC, and he could have 
changed a lot in that period, but as a reader, the change came rather 
abruptly to me. But it only took me a short while to get used to it, 
and then I loved it! Like some other people, I was getting a bit 
tired of Harry being good and wise all the time
 He was starting to 
look a bit like a Gary Stu to me (IMHO). His behaviour bothered me a 
lot less in OoP, actually, then on the only other occasion he seems 
to be doing something that feels morally wrong (to me) - disliking 
Cedric Diggory in GoF, just because he's going out with Cho. Now 
*that* bothered me, because he was being so 'just' about everything 
and anything, and then all of a sudden, he did something that wasn't 
nice. But in OoP, I can really feel he anger and resentment, and, 
well, it just makes more sense, even if I could have kicked him at 
some points. I really thought she described some of his adolescent 
feelings well - very recognisable. :-p And Sirius
 well, actually I 
really loved his darker side. I never liked Sirius much, but in OoP, 
for the first time, he really had my sympathy. Even when he was being 
an utter git. His behaviour fitted much better with someone who has 
been locked in Azkaban for over ten years than it did in the two 
previous books. Every time he said something unkind, well, I felt 
sorry for him. Especially when he told Harry that he wasn't as much 
like his father as he'd thought. The moment I read it, I hated him 
for saying something so horrible, but the next, I felt really sorry 
for him, because it just seemed to show how much he missed James. He 
wanted James back through Harry, and that was just really sad. And 
though I resented the fact that he wanted Harry to be like James, at 
the same time, I'm rather happy that he died at the moment Harry did 
something James surely would have done - breaking into the MoM to 
save Sirius. I'm sure that at that moment, Sirius must have been 
very, very proud of Harry, even if he probably was also very angry 
with him for getting lured in. It felt like a small comfort to me, 
that Sirius did find his best friend back in his Godson at the time 
that he died. I can't help but think he might have got very 
disappointed in Harry later on, if he got to see more of him, and 
noticed just how different he was from James. So in a way, this was 
kind of like a good ending for me, even if I did feel very sorry to 
see Sirius die.

And James
 evil!James Potter. Woohoo! I loved that. Well, not quite 
evil, but close enough. Like someone else (again, I forgot who), I 
was really getting fed up with the way James always got portrayed as 
the perfect little boy - both in canon and in fanfiction. I'm really 
happy that he turns out to be less than perfect. Much less than 
perfect, it seems, though I'm sure he had many good sides, too. It 
wasn't just his treatment of Snape that bothered me - his treatment 
of Wormtail was bad, too. The way he looked down on him for not 
getting the question about the werewolf right - all right, his remark 
may have been justifiable, but the way he said it
 - and the way he 
showed off in front of him later. Not to mention Sirius' remark - 
what was it? Stop it before Wormtail wets him pants? Well, that was 
really cruel. But I suppose we already suspected Sirius was less than 
perfect, too.

I adored Lupin, though. At the beginning of the book, it bothered me 
that he kept being the voice of calm, of reason, of wisdom - no, I 
don't like perfect characters much :-) - but the fact that he 
wouldn't intervene when his friends were bullying Snape
 Well, that 
made Lupin all the more likeable to me. All the more vulnerable, too. 
He must have been really frightened to lose his friends. Still, I was 
pleased to see that - well, at least in this case - he didn't 
participate in Snape's torture. Even if, of course, it was very wrong 
of him not to intervene - considering he was a prefect. But, well, 
this flaw just accentuated his good side, I think - it made his 
kindness in the rest of the book and in PoA all the more credible. 
And I suppose this partly explains why Lupin was so tolerant with 
Snape in PoA. 
On the one hand, I too was sorry we didn't get more of a reaction 
from Lupin when Sirius died, but actually, the fact that it said 
that "Lupin spoke as if every word caused him pain" (paraphrasing), 
and nothing more, made me even more sad. It was his quiet grief that 
really touched me, more than any dramatic scene would have. At the 
moment when Sirius died, it really wasn't Harry I felt sorry for, but 
Lupin. Standing there, trying to hold Harry back, trying to stay calm 
and collected
 That hurt. More than Harry's frantic behaviour. Though 
I did feel very sorry for Harry once he arrived at Dumbledore's 
office. 

Well, and then there's Snape, of course. I was really happy to find 
out he isn't some rich boy, and that he has, indeed, suffered in the 
past. I really liked the way JKR managed to make him be such an 
utterly horrible git and at the same time so - well, pitiable, 
especially in the past. Though I'm sure he has probably done less 
than kind things to MWPP, too. His horrible behaviour towards Harry 
stopped me from feeling *too* sorry for him, but at the same time, he 
gained a lot of sympathy from a lot of readers, I'm sure. (And, well, 
he was always one of my favourite characters - next to Lupin.) I was 
also pleasantly surprised that he actually bothered to 1. give 
Umbridge false Veritaserum when she wanted to question Harry about 
Sirius (though I suppose that if Umbridge found that out, the Order 
would have lost its meeting point) and 2. did contact Sirius 
immediately after Harry warned him. Apparently his anger didn't lead 
him *that* far that he wanted Sirius dead. Though I suppose that if 
Sirius *was* captured that would have endangered Snape, too, as 
Sirius knows a lot of secrets
 and I'm sure Dumbledore wouldn't have 
been too happy if he found out Snape had known something and not 
acted upon it. Still, I thought his hatred of Sirius might carry him 
far enough not to care about all that just so he could see Sirius 
dead. 
Like others, I'm wondering why, precisely, this would be his worst 
memory. Of course, we only saw a part of it, and I would be very 
curious to know what happened next. And then, there's the two other 
memories he placed in it, of course. Still. Some people seem to think 
it's his worst memory because of Lily's role in it. Quite possible. 
Personally, the thing that really hit me was the greying underwear. 
As someone else pointed out, this is probably a sign that he isn't 
very rich - I certainly took it that way. So then, after a while, I 
started thinking that perhaps *this* is what makes the event so 
humiliating. Maybe nobody is quite aware what Snape's finances are, 
and, well, the greying underwear made that a little obvious. For as 
far as we know, there don't seem to be many poor Slytherins. 
Slytherins, on the contrary, seem to be looking down on people's 
poverty - I'm taking Draco/Ron as an example here, though I suppose 
the Malfoy family could just be particularly annoying like that. I 
wonder how Malfoy Sr. treated Snape. But, anyway, I'm digressing, 
what I was trying to say was that perhaps it was the fact that it was 
revealed that he isn't rich that embarrassed him so much. Or at 
least, that *he* felt it was being revealed. Especially if he hung 
around with people like Malfoy and the Lestranges. I mean, this must 
have *really* hurt, and apparently Dumbledore quite understands it, 
if he actually lends his Pensieve to Snape. And, well
 Snape actually 
threw a jar at Harry's head. I couldn't believe that. As horrible as 
that action might seem, it was that perhaps most of all, which showed 
Snape's vulnerability. He attacked a student. I'm not sure of he 
*was* aiming at Harry's head, but still
 I've never seen him lose it 
like that. Even with Sirius in the Shrieking Shack, he merely 
threatened the guy with his wand, and managed to restrain himself 
from doing actual damage. I know he was planning on handing Sirius to 
the Dementors, but it's just that the fact that he didn't really *do* 
anything to Sirius himself seems to indicate that physically 
attacking someone isn't his thing. But the way he handled Harry
 
Though I suppose he may have simply been restraining himself from 
going for his wand and hexing him, and threw the jar instead to 
relieve his anger.
This might also explain just why he was so extremely disappointed 
about losing (or rather, not gaining) his Order of Merlin in PoA. 
That was something that *would* have given him a certain status.
I suppose this poverty thing actually gives Lupin and Snape something 
in common. Something else Lupin must easily be able to understand - 
the humiliation of being poor, though he seems to have got over it 
himself. 

But let's get back to Snape. And Harry. For all that I liked their
 
um
 dubious behaviour, I really felt like slapping them by the end of 
the book. They're both really stubborn, aren't they? And Harry seems 
to have got over his father's behaviour rather quick. Despite the 
fact that he found out Snape might have a valid reason for hating his 
father, despite the fact that Snape did do everything he could to 
help with Sirius - he still hates him. Same thing with Snape. The one 
thing Snape seems to have hated about James is his arrogance - or 
perhaps more the fact that James actually had a good and seemingly 
easy life. Then he finds out Harry didn't. At all. You'd think he 
might lighten up a little, and realise Harry isn't like his father. 
Right. I read several messages from people that thought Snape *was* 
softening up. I'm not sure where they draw that conclusion from. I 
read someone saying that Snape had asked: "whose dog was that?", (or 
something like that) *softly*. I hate to disappoint you, but when 
Snape says something softly, that doesn't necessarily mean he's being 
nice. Quite on the contrary. Unless he's really very, very angry and 
shouts at the top of his voice, Snape speaking softly usually 
indicates he's being malicious. In GoF, when Harry's name comes out 
of the goblet, he says something like "it's nobody's fault but 
Potter's", *also* in a soft voice, with his eyes glittering 
maliciously. So I really don't take that as an indication that he's 
softening up. He lmight just as well have been laughing at Harry. And 
his avoiding Harry's eye for a while only indicates Snape's own 
vulnerability to me. Remember he actually threw Harry's vial to the 
floor afterwards in a lesson, and in a rather malicious way, which I 
really wouldn't consider "soft". The only thing I can find that might 
indicate him mellowing out a little, is the scene in which he catches 
Harry with his wand pointed at Draco, with Harry saying he's trying 
to decide which curse to throw at the other boy. It says in the book 
that Snape stares at him. Not glares, not sneers, but for one moment 
apparently simply *stares*. And his reaction really isn't all that 
malicious; not by Snape's standards anyway. He only takes ten points. 
Which is really little considering Harry was actually planning on 
*attacking* a student. And admitted as much rather defiantly. And 
Snape's sneers about there being no points left - well, I wouldn't 
have expected any less from Snape. It's no more than his usual 
behaviour. While I actually expected him to jump down Harry's throat 
after his casual remark about deciding which spell to throw at Draco. 
It seems to me that at that moment, Harry must have reminded him more 
of James than ever before. This time, he really was being arrogant - 
or impudent, towards a professor. Towards Snape. And he let it go 
relatively easy, considering Snape's behaviour toward Harry when he 
isn't actually doing anything to bother Snape. And considering Draco 
Malfoy and his cronies are actually both standing there. 

I agree with those that say that Snape does seem to be rather happy 
McGonagall is back. Though I note they call each other "Professor 
(name)". That was actually pretty funny. Why would two teachers call 
each other "Professor Snape" and "Professor McGonagall"? Just sounded 
odd. At first, I thought that sounded rather cold, but now that I 
think of it, it could actually sound rather fond. Not really sure, 
though. But yes, his stepping forwards did seem rather eager. And his 
admitting that maybe Gryffindor deserved the points - however 
grudgingly. He might have made a bigger point of that, especially 
since Malfoy was still there, but he didn't. Some might say that was 
because he was softening up toward Harry, but I really think he was 
just too happy to see McGonagall to make a fuss. Well, I suppose 
Umbridge also probably showed them that really, the other isn't so 
bad. Some people seem to think Umbridge is as bad as Snape. I really 
thought she was *much* worse. Except for the incident with the jar, 
I've never seen Snape try to hurt a student. Of course Dumbledore 
prohibited it, but physical punishments were legal for a while when 
Umbridge became Headmistress. And Snape doesn't seem to have taken 
his chance. I also felt that Umbridge actually managed being *more* 
malicious than Snape. She was, of course, in a position of power, but 
a part of me believes that if it would have been Snape there, he 
would have no doubt been absolutely horrible - but not as bad as 
*that*. I think that if the Pensieve scene made Snape more likeable 
(yes, and the bit where Harry breaks through his thoughts), Umbridge 
certainly helped, too. Compared to her I thought Snape was almost 
nice. Well, that might be a bit exaggerated, but really, not much so. 
There was a discussion some time ago about whether Snape was a good 
teacher, but whatever the case, compared to Umbridge, he certainly 
seems a lot better. 
I really thought it a pity that we didn't get Snape being utterly 
snarky with Umbridge. Well, I suppose he couldn't, since she was from 
the Ministry, and, well, on Malfoy's side. Not that McGonagall and 
Flitwick didn't do a brilliant job. I know everybody loved McGonagall 
(I certainly did, too), but really, Flitwick was pretty hilarious 
himself with his cheerful ways. And Sprout. One of the things that 
really made me laugh was that, after Harry's interview was published, 
certain teachers rewarded him for it. Like Sprout. Who gave him 
twenty points for passing a water jug. I don't know why, but that 
utterly cracked me up. :-)
Still, a pity about Snape. Not that he seemed to like her much. Even 
if she *was* from the Ministry.
Many people have before argued that Snape might just be putting up an 
act about everything - like hating Harry and Neville, or just 
Gryffindors in general - just to keep in the good books of the Death 
Eaters. I never believed it for a moment. But now I have to admit he 
does seem quite capable of it - what with the way he reacted to 
Harry's revelation about Padfoot. Nice piece of acting. Though I 
still think he genuinely hates Harry (rather obviously) and really 
dislikes the Gryffindors in general and Neville in particular, now 
JKR does have me wondering exactly *how much* of it is genuine. I 
suppose he may also be acting, and enjoying the act. After all, he 
can be horrible with a clear conscience - it's all to keep his façade 
as a DE. 

Then, on a completely different note, there's Percy. I was really 
shocked by his behaviour, too. It never really occurred to me until 
someone mentioned it on this list, that he might be under Imperius, 
or something like that. Because, yes, I do agree he was out of 
character. I can't get the scene in GoF out of my mind, right at the 
end of the second task by the lake, with Percy running up to Ron. And 
actually walking into the water. Which really was unusual for Percy, 
and did prove he actually *cared*. So the absolute lack of reaction 
from Percy - yes, that was really weird. On the other hand, though, 
if he *was* under Imperius, then why did he write to Ron? Because 
that *did* really seem like the Percy kind of thing to do. And why 
would anyone under Imperius order him to do so? They can't have 
really hoped he'd manage to convince Ron, could they? I don't really 
know what to think of it. On the other hand, I suppose Lucius Malfoy 
would be very happy to turn Arthur Weasley's own son against him



Did anyone else get really annoyed with the translation of - er - 
Muggle sayings into wizarding ones? They just weren't funny. Though I 
suppose kids might find them amusing. But just the one would have 
been quite enough. 

On the whole, I really adored the book, though. I've heard several 
people say (not necessarily on this list) that it looked too much 
like fanfiction. Well I suppose there just are so many fanfictions 
there isn't much JKR could find that hasn't already been tried out in 
some way. I did get a bit of a surrealistic feeling with this book - 
even for a Harry Potter book. The way the Ministry, and especially 
Umbridge, acted, was just a little too much for me. But really, it's 
not like I actually mind. I thought it was brilliant. Could hardly 
breathe through the last 100 pages.

OK, so now I'm finally going to stop raving. :-)

Have a good day everyone,
Cheerful greetings,
Rane.