Snape and the Kappa: a Flint? (Was: Snape and Lupin's Character Arcs)

[nrenka]

No: HPFGUIDX 119358


> Carol responds:
> I'm still not convinced of this reasoning. If it were *Snape's* 
> error (as opposed to JKR's), Hermione, who *has* read the book, 
> would have pointed it out (or at least cast a significant glance at 
> Harry and mentioned it afterwards).

Argument from absence is generally not a terribly strong argument, I 
would say (as a general point throughout all the books).  If you want 
to take that tack, I can prove all kinds of things with it.  
Hermione's pretty much been beaten down in class by now.  One could 
equally well argue that she notices it, but it's simply not mentioned 
in the text.  We get nowhere from absence.

> There's no point in having Snape make an error in PoA if that error 
> isn't pointed out in PoA, especially if the idea is to reveal that 
> Snape is less of a DADA expert than he perceives himself to be. JKR 
> has no guarantee that her readers have read FBWFT--many of them 
> probably haven't.

Sure there is.  We continually have to re-evaluate what we think we 
know in light of new revelations and information.  For those who go 
forth and buy the book for charity, there's an amusing little tidbit 
that may make them go oh, or, for the savvy, make them go "I knew it!"

<snip>

> So, I'm suggesting, when she discovers that she was wrong about 
> Kappas being found in Mongolia, she covers her own error by 
> attributing it to Snape.
> 
> You say that this isn't a Flint because there's no inconsistency
> between books. But there *is* an inconsistency between Snape's 
> saying that Kappas are found in Mongolia and the "corrected" 
> or "official" version in FBWFT, and that inconsistency is just as 
> much a Flint as it would be if the inconsistency were in the HP 
> books themselves.

This is just plain not a flint, and there is no way it can be twisted 
into being one.

A flint is something where it clearly doesn't make sense, and is 
usually involving some objective fact--for instance, it is 
corroborated a number of places as to what Marcus Flint's year is.  
There is no positive statement about Kappas but Snape's assertion, so 
this is clearly not a piece of information like Marcus Flint's age.
 
Again, it only rings false if you assumed that Snape was for sure 
right in the first place.  This assumption seems to stem from the 
perception that well, Snape is always right.  This is, given this new 
information and other occurrences in the text, not a justified 
assumption.  JKR's explanation is that Snape is wrong.  If you knew 
your folklore, Snape's comment was always a little questionable.  
Now, in many cases she's winging it with the folklore, but she hasn't 
done anything utterly wild with national attributions.

It makes thematic sense, if you think about it, too.  What does it 
gain in characterization (which is in part the intended aspect) is 
poking fun at Snape who is often supremely and utterly confident that 
he knows what is right, and often unwilling to listen to others.  
This is canonical--I'm thinking of his convinctions, absolutely 
solid, that Harry is arrogant and fame-seeking, and his "Shut up you 
foolish girl!" directed at Hermione, when she dares to try to 
interject statements in BOTH the Shack and the Hospital Wing.

But from a text-only POV, it honestly doesn't matter whether JKR is 
covering her own mistake by blaming it on Snape--we now know, from 
her own pen, that Kappas come from Japan (as they always did) and 
Snape was wrong.  Ergo, he is wrong.

By the way, kappas are fairly well-known as to their location.  I 
think it's frankly more than a little defensive to assume so solidly 
that JKR messed up her research than to note that a character may 
have gotten something wrong.

<snip>

> Carol, wondering if Nora can provide evidence *from the HP books
> themselves* to support her view that the FBWFT text should take
> precedence over PoA in this instance

Hey, I have the author on my side in this one.  FB is issued by her 
as the schoolbook that Harry et. al. were using for that class, and 
is thus a fairly clear supplement to canon.  Therefore, we can 
reasonably read it as a source of information about the material 
being discussed in class.  She does things like this all the time, 
where we have to re-think things we 'thought' we knew in light of new 
information.

If you'd like to argue with JKR for making Snape make mistakes, go 
right ahead.  (You also might argue with her for making him greasy-
haired.)  But being as she is the one creating the world and giving 
out the information, there are many more reasons to assume that she 
is right than to cast doubt upon her information because it causes a 
result that you personally are unhappy with.  I fail to see how the 
desire to excuse Snape from any mistakes overrides the basic issue 
that we've been given information which makes us rethink our 
position.  This is also an authorial confirmation of a fact, not an 
interpretation of a character.  It doesn't strike me as healthy to 
want to deny author given plain old factual information (which is in 
the same class as middle names and all that) just because it's not 
necessarily positive for a character.

-Nora wonders if Carol can provide evidence from the HP books that 
Snape should always be taken as an absolute master in his field and 
all other aspects and never makes mistakes