[HPforGrownups] Re: Snape as the dark young man/Extra Material On Trelawney's Card Reading

[Tammy Rizzo]

No: HPFGUIDX 141958

> --- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "justcarol67" <justcarol67 at y...>
> wrote:
> >
> > > Ceridwen now:
> > > Can anyone point me to the first reading, where Trelawney is 
turning 
> > > over the hand of spades?  <snip> The reason I want to 
> > > know is, does anyone else think the 'Knave of Spades' might refer 
to 
> > > Snape?  He has dark hair and eyes, is young compared to 
Dumbledore, 
> > > is possibly troubled, and he dislikes Trelawney.  What else was 
in 
> > > that reading? <snip>
> > 
Was I the only one who took this scene at face value?  I thought it was 
JKR being funny.  After "no that can't be right," Trelawney runs smack 
into the troubled young man who dislikes her (Harry).  

Allie


[Now Tammy says:]   
Oh, no, Allie, you're not the only one.  I read it as straightforward as
that, as well.  Trelawney turns up a card about a troubled, dark young man
who dislikes her, and suddenly there's Harry, a troubled, dark young man who
dislikes her.  Straightforward, simple, and obvious.  Just like the rest of
the books, until I started hanging out around here, that is.  ;-)
 
I'm sure that JKR has some understanding of Tarot, or she wouldn't have had
Trelawney use it, knowing readers who use Tarot would call her on her
blunders (look what we do to her maths, after all!).  However, a good writer
will not assume that ALL of her readers will of course know all about
anything she uses in her books (one thing I just *hate* are authors who
scatter their manuscript with dialogue in other languages; after all, just
how many of us actually HAVE several different X-to-Y translating
dictionaries sitting by our reading chair, huh?).  A good writer will, every
chance she can, use the simple, straightforward reading to make her point,
rather than entrusting her desired result to some relatively obscure
knowledge that only a handful of her readers will have access to?  The
various meanings attributed to Tarot cards (and I do mean 'various', as they
vary from deck to deck and from reader to reader) would certainly be a fun
and interesting way to slip in a little something extra into the meaning of
that scene, which is fine -- make us stretch for the secondary meanings,
please, it's good for us.  But so far, she has never (that I can recall)
made us really stretch and study and do research in order to get her primary
meaning.  It's just not good authorship to make your readers work too hard
to turn the page like that.
 
Sorry, I'm rambling.  I should know better than to post before . . . aw,
heck, I should know better than to post.  I just wanted Allie to know she's
not alone.  :-)


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