OOP: Snape's greasiness

[rane_ab]

No: HPFGUIDX 63857

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I'm sorry if this has come up before, but did anyone else think that 
JKR was really hammering on Snape's greasiness in OoP? Just from 
memory, I found the following quotes, and I probably missed some:

(page numbers are for the UK version)

"In the very centre of the group Harry saw the dark, greasy-haired 
head and prominent nose of his least favourite teacher at Hogwarts, 
Professor Snape." (p. 73)
"Snape looked around at him, his face framed between curtains of 
greasy black hair." (p. 457)
"Snape pulled out his wand from an inside pocket of his robes and 
Harry tensed in his chair, but Snape merely raised the wand to his 
temple and placed its tip into the greasy roots of his hair." (p. 471)
"
 a greasy-haired teenager sat alone in a dark bedroom, pointing his 
wand at the ceiling, shooting down flies
 " (p. 522)


(In the Pensieve)
"His hair was lank and greasy (
)." (p. 564)
"(
) and his oily hair was jumping about his face." (p. 566)
"'I was watching him, his nose was touching the parchment,' said 
Sirius viciously. 'There'll be great grease marks all over it, they 
won't be able to read a word.'" (p. 569)
"Snape was hanging upside-down in the air, his robes falling over his 
head to reveal skinny, pallid legs and a pair of greying underpants." 
(p. 571)
(Personally, I took the greying underpants to mean they were old, but 
someone pointed out underwear doesn't go grey if you wash it too 
often - it gets grey from an oily skin. Though I still contend 
underwear does grey if washed too much - or at least *seems* grey 
because it is thinning and gets covered in little fluffs; the person 
in question (sorry, I forgot who it was) does have Lily's remark on 
her side:
"'And I'd wash your pants if I were you, Snivellus." (p. 571) On the 
other hand, she was angry when she said that. So I'll take this as a 
*possible* reference to Snape's greasiness.)


"'You took my last bottle to interrogate Potter,' he said, surveying 
her coolly through his greasy curtains of black hair." (p. 656)


Maybe JKR was just being descriptive, but off the top of my head, I 
don't think she mentioned Snape's greasiness more than once or twice 
in each of the other books. Of course it does play a big role in the 
Pensieve, but still, this really jumped out at me. 
I've never been much of a supporter for the Vampire!Snape theory - 
quite on the contrary - but now I'm not so sure anymore. Does he have 
to cover himself in some oil to protect himself from the sun (as many 
have suggested before OoP)?
On the other hand, we mainly read that his *hair* is greasy (apart 
from Sirius' remark in the Pensieve and possibly the greying 
underwear, I can only remember the scene in GoF (The Egg and the Eye) 
where it is somewhere mentioned that his temple is greasy - which of 
course would be no surprise if his hair is greasy). And hair is a 
dead matter, so why would he want to protect his hair? And if that 
greying underwear does refer to his oily skin - well, I don't think 
much sun would pass through his robes *and* his underwear.
So what's up with it? If he got teased over this at school - and it 
didn't sound like it was the first time Sirius mocked him over this 
particular fact in the Pensieve scene - why didn't he do anything 
about it? Why does he still have the same problem twenty years later? 
Surely there are plenty of showers and baths at Hogwarts. This just 
doesn't make much sense. I know some argued that when you have a lot 
of thin hair, it simply *looks* as though it is greasy - but this 
seems to go further than that. Does he have some kind of disease 
through which he can't stand water and/or soap? On the other hand, 
he's only ever mentioned as being *greasy* - never explicitly as 
having a lack of hygiene (apart from Lily's remark in the Pensieve). 
I'm not sure what to think of it. I know the subject of his 
greasiness has come up in this group before OoP, but I just thought 
JKR was really repeating this particular fact peculiarly often in 
OoP. Or am I just imagining things (quite possible)?

Just wondering what you all think of this.

Cheerful greetings,
Rane.