Snape's Worst (and Best!) OoP Moment?

phoenixgod2000 jmrazo at hotmail.com
Tue Jul 12 21:29:34 UTC 2005


No: HPFGUIDX 132568

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, Magda Grantwich 
<mgrantwich at y...> wrote: 
> You say that like it's a bad thing.
> 
> What Snape wants - and is getting - in this scene is
> simply...payback.  He's taunting Sirius and getting him riled up
> because he knows he can turn the tables now and there's jack-all
> Sirius can do about it.  He's enjoying having the control.
> 
> I suppose I should feel outraged about it but after the pensieve
> scene I figure that Sirius had it coming.  (And I'm not open to
> changing my mind on this, just to cut short the deluge of email I'm
> going to get over it).

I think one of the things we are going to learn in the upcoming 
books is some more about Snapes background that is going to balance 
out the *apparently* unjustified attack against him. I find it 
difficult to believe that Snape was always just book up his nose 
innocent when it came to the Marauder/Snape battles. Really if he 
was just a shy studious boy who was forever being picked on by 
others he would have been a Ravenclaw like Luna. Remember, this guy 
is a Slytherin. Ambition and Cunning. Just because he didn't give as 
good as he got in that scene doesn't mean he was always a victim.

As for what Sirius has coming. I think you need to keep perspective. 
Sirius (and James) were obnoxious schoolboys who performed the 
magical equivenlent of pulling down someones pants during PE class.  
Snape is a terrorist.  I would say that he has a whole lot more 
coming to him than Sirius, who spent thirteen years in Azakban 
paying for sins, real and imagined. IMO, I would say that you are 
severely whitewashing Snape's actions in that scene.
  
> Well, it really wasn't Harry's business, was it?  This was the 
latest
> outburst in an old feud between two peers. 

Well, Sirius is Harry's godfather. I would say thats enough to make 
it Harry's business.

I should probably get around to giving my two cents on Snape's worst 
moment in OOTP. I don't think it's Snape/Sirius. Its not great but 
the two of them are adults and peers. For that reason alone it 
cannot hold a candle to the way Snape treats Harry.  I would say his 
worst moment is the whole Occulmency debacle. From the moment he 
decided to announce that it would be under the guise of something 
designed to humiliate Harry to every insult and invasive mind 
invasion, the lessons were an excercise in just how small and petty 
a man Snape is.
 
> > And just to try to keep things *POSITIVE*, how `bout nominations
> > for Snape's BEST moment in OoP, too?  

It depends on what you mean by best moment. Do you mean the moment 
where he is the most human and likeable? Or the part where I cheered 
him on? Or the part where I thought he was the most entertaining?

I thought he was the most human and likeable when he seems to 
express genuine pleasure at seeing Proffessor McGonagall healthy at 
the end of the OOTP. Maybe it was the way I read it but I thought it 
was probably the warmest and most decent Snape had ever been in the 
entire series.

I cheered him on and found him humorous in the poison/Vers scene 
with Umbridge. I liked it because he was using his powers of sarcasm 
and bitterness on an appropriate target instead of children. He was 
finally cutting down someone who deserved it. I find sarcastic and 
bitter characters very entertaining in almost all cases but until 
this moment, Snape had always used sarcasm to reveal his own 
pettiness instead of revealing the pettiness of others (which is the 
genius of many characters in this mold).

phoenixgod2000









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