Snape in the Shrieking Shack (was re:time-turning)

[Nora Renka]

No: HPFGUIDX 112750

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, Magda Grantwich 
<mgrantwich at y...> wrote:

> He genuinely thought Sirius was guilty.  Only if Sirius was really
> and truly guilty would Snape have derived the most unspeakably
> wonderful satisfaction from turning him in.  Snape's pinned a lot of
> his own personal self-esteem on being right about Sirius Black for
> over 20 years while everyone else - including that uber-prat James
> Potter - was completely taken in by Sirius' so-called charm and
> supposed good looks.  Only by presenting a guilty Sirius Black to
> Dumbledore and saying "Ah ha!  NOW you have to admit that I was
> right!  But no matter.  I forgive you, Headmaster for doubting me 
> all thse years."  
> 
> An innocent Sirius being dementored would not have been satisfying 
> at all.  It ignores Snape's iron morality with his exquisitely honed
> sense of fairness.

You mean 'exquisitely idiosyncratic sense of fairness', right? :)

I think that is correct--Snape really does believe that Black is 
guilty.  Of course, he does so *in part* because he wants to believe 
it so badly; let me pimp my old chronology back at message 107020, 
for those who want to look at it.

That whole scene has always been the thing that troubles me most 
about Snape, and this is why: he generally *does* seem to have a 
fairly strict sense of responsibility about doing the generally right 
thing, even when he sometimes goes about it in a way that leaves 
something to be desired--I can deal with that.  I...I...I just don't 
know quite what to make of:

"You see, Minister?" said Snape. "Confunded, both of them....Black's 
done a very good job on them...." (p. 389, hb)

and

"But if -- if there was a mistake --"

"KEEP QUIET, YOU STUPID GIRL!"  Snape shouted, looking suddenly quite 
deranged.  "DON'T TALK ABOUT WHAT YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND!" (p. 360, hb)

To be in a condition of such absolute fury about a doubt being raised 
means that one must be *conscious* that a doubt has been raised, and 
therefore be partaking in that doubt to at least some degree, enough 
to have a strong desire to crush it.  To have a desire about one's 
desires is one of the classic definitions of being a person--JKR 
really makes Snape live here, doesn't she?

I'm split, here.  I think there's a possibility that Snape was 
starting to suspect that Black was innocent, but wanted him 
dementored anyways, and I might locate that at the shift in behavior 
when he starts sucking up to Fudge.  

But I *do* think he really thought Black was guilty for all of those 
years, and there's some kind of strange personal investment going on 
here that we just don't know about.  I don't see Snape as evil enough 
to keep silent about an innocent Black in Azkaban for all those 
years, and I don't see it quite meshing with his behavior in PoA.

-Nora, cautious ex-devotee of the MAGIC DISHWASHER