Snape as father figure, was Sirius as Father Figure

[Amanda Geist]

No: HPFGUIDX 130922

Alla:

> There are SO many people starting with
> Dumbledore who attempt to provide Harry with gudance. There are SO
> few adults who attempt to love Harry for himself.

I differentiate "providing Harry with guidance" and "loving him for himself"
pretty cleanly. Read on.

> I wish he would have such person in his life and NO, Dumbledore's
> declaration of love was not impressive much for me.
>
> Maybe Remus will step up to the plate

Let's stir the anthill. (Assuming, of course, someone has not already done
so; my email is woefully slow to download and I'm far behind. I want to
respond and get to bed, so I may miss some bit of brilliance that came
later.)

Father figures =/= love, necessarily. I think the one that Harry will grow
closer to--and please note I do *not* say love, or even like--is Snape.
Snape and Harry are the ones who need to see each other for themselves, and
not for the emotional associations they represent.

Snape has been a consistent male authority figure from day one. He
represents a critical aspect of "father": the authority, the disciplinarian,
the existing Power whose standards and restrictions the child rebels
against. He's the father who won't listen; who doesn't seem to care; who
sets rules and allows no excuses; whose rules seem to be arbitrary and mean;
who is *always there.*

Snape is the aspect of father that a child appreciates after he is grown.
When the value of discipline and limits are appreciated; when the ability to
see multiple viewpoints has matured. Harry is only beginning to reach this
point. I think he will come farther along this path in HBP. And so I think
it is the relationship with Snape that will fill a certain emotional niche
for him. Maybe not pleasantly; but effectively, like Snape himself.

Snape and Harry, in my opinion, grew closer in OoP, and not one whit warmer.
There is a tremendously strong bond between them, which grew stronger
through OoP, and which neither of them seems inclined to break. It is a bond
of emotion, and although the emotion is hatred, it is a bond nonetheless.
Neither of them will release one iota of that emotion; they remain embedded
in each other. The subjectivity of this bond gets very in the way of them
appreciating, or truly seeing, each other.

I think Snape holds to his hatred for a reason; while it's real enough, I
think it also helps with a smokescreen he must maintain for his role. The
times we have seen Snape lose control--for Snape is quite controlled--have
been with respect to James and Sirius, not Harry (for I consider Snape's
reaction after the Pensieve scene to be to James, not to Harry). Snape finds
it convenient, and easy, to keep hating Harry, but I don't think there's
real passion there. So Snape is able to have a degree of objectivity towards
Harry; it allows him to teach Occlumency to him, and it allows him some
effectiveness as a father figure.

Harry, on the other hand, has not had one belief to date about Snape's
actions that was not entirely Harry-centric. And his scapegoating of Snape
after Sirius' death is an active resistance to objectivity. I think that as
Harry grows older, and finds himself in more and more challenging situations
where there is not one "right" answer or clear path, he will begin to
appreciate that there may be more than one reason and motivation. And as
soon as he admits to himself that Snape may have some non-Harry reason for
his actions, I think he will begin to realize how valuable (I do not say
pleasant) the lessons he has learned from Snape really are--but we have not
seen this potential in Harry yet. He is clinging to the bonds he has--and
one of the strongest, most enduring, and most defining is his negative bond
with Snape. Objectivity would threaten that, and Harry needs as much of his
world to stay the same as he can hold, right now. So the likelihood of him
recognizing, much less appreciating, Snape's role are low, in my opinion.

Which puts Harry at risk, emotionally, and Snape at risk, plotwise. Because
the last aspect I mentioned of Snape as a father figure--that he is always
there--is something that Harry hates. But it, and Snape, are constants of
his world. When Sirius goes through the gate, it is the fact that Sirius
does not answer--is not *there* for him--that brings home his loss. If Harry
had to realize that Snape was no longer there, I think the loss and shock
would be as great. It would not be a hole defined by love; but it would be a
tremendous hole--the disappearance of someone who represented such a large
investment of emotion over so long a time. The loss of Snape would devastate
Harry. I suspect it would take something that catastrophic to shock Harry
into a different view of Snape.

Heh.

~Amanda