Is Harry really capable of great love?

[kiricat4001]

No: HPFGUIDX 136543

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "bennetfan101" 
<bennetfan101 at y...> wrote:
> Hee, those were two of my very favourite moments in the books. 
Harry 
> has already been set up as loving his friends and mentors very 
> strongly, and really all that is left is whether or not he will be 
> able to love his enemies. Tom Riddle and Draco Malfoy are 
indicators 
> of his learning to do this eventually, but I personally think that
> the 
> biggest hurdle will be Snape. Snape seems to have so much to do 
with 
> Harry in the series; JKR has now confirmed that the Harry/Snape 
> vendetta is much more personal than Voldemort/Harry. This is 
> understandable; in Harry's mind, to date, Snape has helped cause 
the 
> deaths of Sirius, James, Lily, Dumbledore...it seems as though his 
> reasons for hating Snape are piling up by the year. And yet Snape 
is 
> clearly going to be a very big figure in this war somehow; if he 
can 
> kill Dumbledore before Harry's eyes and STILL remain as ambiguous 
as 
> he is, we know he has to be really important. So I would totally 
be 
> unsurprised if compassion for Snape actually happened to be the 
sort 
> of love required from Harry to defeat Voldemort. It's stretching, 
but 
> it would be a good message to portray...of course, they'll have to 
> resolve a heck of a lot before it comes to this...-_-*

Marianne:

I'd like to add to this thought that Harry has already had at least 
the tinglings of empathy for Snape.  When he entered Snape's 
memories in OoP he did not returen gloating over Snape's 
experiences.  He may not have felt pity, but I think he certainly 
emphathized with Snape's mistreatment, and felt bad about it.  He 
was certainly appalled by James' and Sirius' actions.  Of course, 
Snape seemed sure that Harry was going to blab about this to all of 
his friends, once again assuming that Harry is James, jr. 
 
(Really, with all of Molly's and Hermione's going on about Sirius 
confusing Harry with James in that book, it sure seems like the one 
most assuming the two are exactly the same kind of person is Snape!)