[HPforGrownups] Snape thoughts

[Kathryn Jones]

No: HPFGUIDX 136793

Christopher Nuttall wrote:

snip
> Years pass, and Harry comes to Hogwarts.  Hes very like his father, so Snape hates him,

  but Dumbledore tells him to look after Harry, so he does.  The bad 
chemistry between the two

  prevents Harry from seeing that.  Snapes knowledge of the Dark Arts 
makes him the only other

teacher that can teach Harry to shield his mind, a bad outcome.

Kathy writes:
    We know that Dumbledore suspected that Voldemort would return in 
some form. He kept Snape at the school for 10 years waiting for Harry to 
attend. We also know that Voldemort is the "most accomplished Legilimens 
the world has ever seen". Snape would have known before Dumbledore, 
even, that Voldemort was not dead, because of the Dark Mark, and they 
were both preparing for his return. We know that Dumbledore and Snape 
discussed what was to happen on that return. Dumbledore says in GoF " 
You know what I must ask you to do."
    Now keeping all of this in mind, do we really expect to see Snape 
being kind to Harry? Do we expect to see Snape as the friend of all his 
colleagues? Do we really expect to see him as being supportive to anyone 
but his fellow Death Eater Slytherins? Snape knows that Occlumency will 
help but probably not completely prevent Voldemort from digging through 
his mind. We can be fairly sure that he is going to do a bang-up job of 
it. Snape has, in fact, used these memories of abusing Harry as proof to 
Voldemort that he is faithful. If Snape had to remove a large number of 
memories to hide the fact that he was a reasonable human being, he would 
have huge amounts of time missing from those memories. I am beginning to 
believe that, just like Dumbledore, Snape has been preparing for 
thirteen years for the return of Voldemort and has been very careful not 
to jeopardize his position.
     He could not remove the memories of helping to defeat Quirrel, he 
had to explain them. He could not remove the memory of being sent back 
to spy by Dumbledore and would not have been able to fake other memories 
  to explain why he was late, so he had to use it to explain that he was 
still valuable because DD trusted him. He would not have been able to 
remove the memories of the Order Headquarters, but because he was not 
the secret keeper they did not seem to identify its whereabouts. All of 
the Order members would have been in Snape's head, but he would not be 
able to remove their memories because it would be too obvious if he had 
apparently not seen another Order member in thirteen years.
      This would explain why he never ate at 12 Grimmauld Place, never 
socialized, and why Dumbledore never dumped all over him for picking on 
Gryffindors.
      For Voldemort to look at thirteen years of memories of disliking 
his job, hating his fellow teachers, hating the kids, especially Harry 
and yet, staying where Voldemort sent him, must have been very 
convincing. Considering the importance in the books of Legilimency, 
Occlumency and penseives, I think this could be taken as a fairly 
noticeable hint that what we see through Harry's eyes, may not be the 
whole story.
      I am not suggesting that Snape is a fluffy bunny, mind you. A 
warm, kind, supportive person would not have been able to pull this 
behaviour off for so many years without cracking under the guilt. Snape 
seems to manage nicely and even put heart and soul into his performance. 
All this and gets paid for it as well.
KJ