DD's respect for Snape (Was: Unreliable narrator - The Snape Timeline

[nrenka]

No: HPFGUIDX 117613


--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "potioncat" <willsonkmom at m...> 
wrote:

> Potioncat:
> I've always wondered about this quote.  It's from PoA chp 21, and 
> it takes place in the hospital wing after Black is captured,
> Snape is talking, "You haven't forgotten that, Headmaster? You 
> haven't forgotten that he once tried to kill *me*?"
> 
> JKR did the italics...or the Scholastic editor did.  Not, he tried 
> to *kill* me but he tried to kill *me*  It's as if Snape sees his 
> relationship to DD as something special enough that being the 
> target of murder should have been important.

I'd feel remiss in not posting the continuation, since the two parts 
are so much more interesting when put together:

"My memory is as good as it ever was, Severus," said Dumbledore 
quietly.

This smacks of a reminder of some sort, and I'm not quite sure what 
to do with it.  It doesn't come across as dismissive per se, but I 
can't help but feeling it as something of a rebuke--'You and I both 
know what actually happened', with perhaps the continuation 'and it's 
not what matters now even though it was awful', OR perhaps 'and you 
know that's not what really went on'.

For my own largely unsupported two cents, I feel some definite quasi-
paternal vibes coming from Dumbledore towards Snape, but on the other 
hand, I think Dumbledore must also know what Snape is capable of and 
tries to keep him reined in, even inject a little humor and levity 
into his life.  No idea if it's taken at all.  What sits at the back 
of my mind troublingly is that we've seen Dumbledore tends to 
underestimate the power of personal feelings, I think partially 
because he is both old and powerful--the things that trouble others 
don't trouble him.  Has Dumbledore underestimated the damage Snape 
can do to others on a daily basis within the school (possible)?  I'm 
certainly not a fan of ESE!Snape, but I wonder.

-Nora notes that she has read many, many discussions (not here) of 
how Dumbledore treats the poor innocent Snape like trash, and is 
merely using everyone around him in a mercenary manner for his own 
ends