Harry mastering his emotions in HPB (was: Plot in OotP)

[cubfanbudwoman]

No: HPFGUIDX 118192


SSSusan wrote:
> > This is one of the reasons I've proposed before [and taken some 
> > grief for doing so, I might add :-)] that Harry will manage to 
> > find a way to work w/ Snape, even if Snape keeps on being a 
> > prick.  I think JKR will show us a Harry who comes to be ready to 
> > really focus on ending VoldyWarII.  He may resist for awhile, he 
> > may be too upset for awhile, but I think he'll come 'round, and I 
> > think a part of that will mean his KNOWING he'll have to work w/ 
> > everyone in the Order, no matter his personal feelings and his 
> > belief that he's despised by at least one of them.
 
Lupinlore: 
> Oh dear.  Well, I suppose that's one way to solve it, but IMO would 
> be a very unsatisfactory way indeed.  A thread like Snape's cries 
> out for resolution, and I just can't see any way for that to happen 
> unless Snape either 1) changes, or 2) dies.  
> 
> Granted that this is Harry's story, as I have pointed out myself.  
> Still, having Severus be nothing more than an unchanging obstacle, 
> a lesson in working with difficult people, would IMO be a huge cop 
> out on JKR's part.  Worse, turning Harry into a turn-the-other 
> cheek martyr, especially if there is also an emphasis on how both 
> Harry and Voldy came from similar childhoods but made different 
> choices, would risk turning the whole story into a moral allegory 
> approaching some of C.S. Lewis' work.  Now, I have nothing against 
> moral allegory per se, and since Lewis was up front about being a 
> Christian Apologist I expect it from him, but that kind of turn 
> just doesn't seem, IMO, to be very, well, inspired when it comes 
> the HP series.
> 
> I grant you all of this is *a* way to bring these issues to a head 
> and a close.  But if JKR goes this route it would strike me as -- 
> and I know this is a strong word but it really does describe how I 
> would feel -- insipid.


SSSusan:
[Breathing deeply -- Lupinlore said *it* would be insipid, not that 
*you* are insipid....]

I've followed the remainer of this thread since I posted yesterday, 
and I really, REALLY don't want to go back to the area of whether 
Harry SHOULD have to do this nor of whether Snape SHOULD change.  Of 
*course* the answer to the first is "No" and the second is "Yes" [imo 
<g>].  But as posters have pointed out ad nauseum, Snape is unlikely 
to do much changing.  He gave us a hint that he might've been willing 
to change a wee bit at the start of Occlumency, but by the time Harry 
stuck his overlarge nose into Snape's penseive, that went rather out 
the window.  

So, unless something extraordinary is coming upon us, I don't imagine 
Snape will be willing to do much changing.  THUS [i.e., 
consequentially, as a direct result of this], I do think Harry will 
have to figure out what to do about that.  If he will be required to 
interact much with Snape in the next two years, then I think he'll 
choose the "adult," "mature," "noble," "responsible," even 
[gasp] "martyr-esque" [choose your fav or least fav term] tack of 
saying, either literally or figuratively to Snape, "Yeah, whatever.  
You go off on that, but I've got work to do."  

I personally am quite open to the two possibilities you've suggested 
of Snape either changing or dying, btw, but what I'm arguing is the 
big IF:  IF Snape lives, IF Snape is totally unwilling and 
uninterested in changing his actions & attitudes, then I think 
Harry's putting the greater good ahead of his own sense of personal 
justice is what he would do.

Lupinlore, since you'd like to have the Snape thread achieve 
resolution, can you paint a picture of how JKR might do such a thing 
[particularly the "change" option] and make it believable for a Snape 
who's shown so little interest or inclination in change?

Siriusly Snapey Susan