Snape- Universal Teacher - Universal Story

[Steve]

No: HPFGUIDX 128459

I've been reading the many posts on Snape and whether he is an
effective teacher or not, and something occurred to me.

I appeal to our resident authority, Shaun, to confirm or deny my
statement, but doesn't Professor Snape make an appearance in every
single British School Boy story ever written? Of course, he appears
under many different names, but isn't it pretty much standard fare for
there to be one very unpleasant teacher in the school to act as the
Hero's foil, nemisis, and antagonist?

I honestly think that relative to the school aspect of the story,
Snape is there simply because every protagonist needs an antagonsit.
Among the students, Draco fills that role, among the teachers Snape
fills that role, in the greater world, Voldemort fills that role. 

Don't get me wrong, in the greater arc of the story, Snape has a
greater more complex role to play, but limiting our perspective to the
school day itself, Snape is there simply to make Harry stuggle and to
give him something to stuggle against. A protagonist is no protagonist
at all if he is not struggling to overcome overwhelming counter forces.

As a side note: Love his or hate him, I would speculate that Snape is
the single most discussed character in this group. I would even
venture the probablility that Snape is more oft discussed that Harry.
He is a complex mutlifacited character whose backstory is both very
interesting and mostly missing. In addition, there is a huge amount of
ambiguity attached to Snape, we suspect he might be good, but he is so
umpleasant it's hard to tell. We know he has done dark, dangerous and
illegal things, now we must wonder, will he do them again, and if he
does, will if be forced by circumstance, or by a genuine desire? 

So many question, and so few answers. As a side-side note, I often
wonder if two more books is really enough to resolve all the
unanswered questions we have? 

Just a few thoughts.

Steve/bboyminn