Snape's Destiny/JKR quotes (or Snape-aholics and Siriophiles)

[cubfanbudwoman]

No: HPFGUIDX 105523

SSSusan, previously:
> > I'm curious how you would take DD's remark to Harry, then, 
> near the 
> > end of OoP:
> > ************************************
> > "Snape stopped giving me Occlumency lessons!" Harry 
> snarled.  "He  threw me out of his office!"
> > 
> > "I am aware of it," said DD heavily.  "I have already said that 
it 
> > was a mistake for me not to teach you myself...."
> > 
> > "Snape made it worse, my scar always hurt worse after 
> lessons with  him--... How do you know he wasn't trying to soften 
> me up for Voldemort...."
> > 
> > "I trust Severus Snape," said DD simply.  "But I forgot--another 
> old  man's mistake--that some wounds run too deep for the 
> healing.  I  thought Professor Snape could overcome his feelings 
> about your  father--I was wrong."  [US, 833]
> > ************************************
> > 
> > Is this speech of DD's part of the act, then?  Or is there 
> > *something* going on w/ Snape besides a minor dislike of 
> Harry and  an act to maintain for preventing spoiled!Harry?  DD 
> said Snape  was "too old & clever" to have allowed Sirius' "feeble 
> taunts" to  hurt him.  How can he turn around a minute later in 
the 
> conversation  and say what he did about Snape's relationship 
> with James?
> > 
> > So IS Snape's hatred [or whatever word is appropriate] of 
> James a  part of Snape's treatment of Harry or not?
> > 


Pippin: 
> That's a typo, right? Or possibly a Freudian slip <veg> In any 
> case it was Sirius that Dumbledore said was too old and clever 
> to be hurt by Snape's feeble taunts. Which makes sense, I think. 
> Sirius, AFAWK,  has never had any real doubts about his 
> courage, so why would Snape's taunts get to him? He could 
> have ignored them if he chose to--but he was bored and spoiling 
> for a fight.
> On the other hand, when Snape threw Harry out of the office, he 
> had just been forced to actually relive his memory of how James 
> had treated him. And fifteen year old Snape was obviously not 
> too old or too clever to let James's taunting, which I wouldn't 
call 
> feeble, get to him.
 

SSSusan again:
OHMYGOSH!!!!!!!!  You are so right!  I can't believe I mixed those 
up.  [blushes deeply]

Hmmmm.... Still, though... I think the *idea* that DD would say one 
man of that age was too old & clever to be hurt by taunts and then 
say ANOTHER man of that age can't get past old stuff w/ Harry's dad 
doesn't quite cut it.  Why would he hold Sirius & Snape to different 
standards in that?  I see what you're saying about Snape having been 
*15* when the taunts hit him, as opposed to Sirius being mid-30s.  
But is that really difference enough for DD?  Maybe so.


Pippin:
> I guess I'm in the middle between SSSusan and Kneasy on 
> this--I think that Dumbledore does see advantages for Harry in 
> letting Snape be his nasty self, and that he co-operates far more 
> closely with Snape than Harry realizes. On the other hand, I think 
> Snape has a genuine loathing of Harry, based on Harry's looks  
> and on Snape's honest belief that fruit doesn't fall far from the 
> tree.  Dumbledore wishes this weren't so, but has no power, as 
> he says, to make men see the truth.
> 
> Perhaps both Snape and Dumbledore feel that   since Harry is 
> going to benefit unfairly from the good things people like Hagrid 
> and Sirius remember about his parents, it's corrective that he 
> suffer for the bad as well. Note that Dumbledore doesn't say that 
> he hoped Snape would overcome the feeling that Harry was like 
> his father--rather he hoped it was Snape's feelings about James 
> that could be overcome.

SSSusan:
I appreciate your take, Pippin. As always, your grasp of canon is 
awesome, and I think this "middle ground" makes sense.  That is an 
excellent point that Harry is going to hear primarily good things 
about his dad from Hagrid, Sirius, Lupin & DD. Snape is really the 
only one to counter that, isn't he?  

What a shock--we're back to not black or white but grey yet again 
with ol' Snapey?! ;-)

Siriusly Snapey Susan