Bullying WAS: Re: Prodigal Sons

[Ceridwen]

No: HPFGUIDX 140848

Betsy Hp:
*(snip)*
>Whenever he chastises Harry, I believe it's because he's 
> caught Harry in some form of wrong doing.
> 
> Snape is described as "bullying" Neville.  But he's also described 
> as "forcing" the students to learn antidotes.  (Which is why I tend 
> to treat any of Harry's descriptors with a grain of salt when it 
> comes to Snape.)

Ceridwen:
First, I haven't read PS/SS in a long time.  The youngest sold it at 
a yard sale.  It was hers, *right*?

Second, I didn't catch onto the Harry-centric focus for a while.  
Someone mentioned that the narrative seems to step outside of Harry 
more often in the first couple or three books, describing him even 
though he probably wouldn't bother to look at himself at that 
moment.  And, PS/SS begins completely objective.  I was a bit 
confuzzled.

Third, I haven't studied anything about voice in narration in a long 
time, so I'll just muddle through this using the best descriptors I 
can.  Sorry if it hinders, I hope it won't!

IIRC, Harry was warned about Snape before he ever met him.  I think 
it was Ron who mentioned something about him being a former DE.  If 
not, it was Percy.  Either way, Harry was already disposed against 
Snape before they met.

I hoped, reading as an adult, that Harry would discount what he'd 
heard and make a seperate judgement.  Mistaking the Harrycentric 
narrative for something more objective, I thought the reader would at 
least get some unbiased information.  My mistake in the voice of the 
narrative went with me into that first Potions class.

I *liked* what I heard in the opening speech.  It seemed to me that 
here was a teacher who really loved his subject.  I was brutally 
shocked, meaning I was thrown out of the narrative, when the 
narrative itself didn't like him.  That didn't make sense to me.  It
seemed that the narration was actively trying to influence my 
feelings as a reader.

Then, for some inexplicable reason, this teacher decided to focus on 
Our Hero, unfairly, I thought, since it was, after all, the first 
lesson.  How on earth could he know what wormwood and asphodel would 
do?  It wasn't like his Muggle aunt made it regularily in her kitchen!

And so, I was seduced into the Harrycentric POV.  I went along, 
thinking as the narrative instructed, that Snape was trying for the 
PS.  Poor old Quirrel!  And, that awful Potions Master made Harry's 
scar hurt, too.  It must be true that he was a DE.  He probably still
retained sympathies.

When we reached the end, and found that Snape had been trying to save 
Harry at the Quidditch match, and that it was poor old bullied 
Quirrel who was really the villain of the piece, I was miffed at the 
narrative, and by extension the author, for not showing me things I 
needed to see.  I still hadn't gotten into the idea of a Harrycentric 
viewpoint.

By book 2, I was mistrustful of the major POV.  I got it that we were 
in Harry's head, seeing things he saw, and being described the things 
he felt.  Harrycentric is not omniscient.  Still, I took certain 
things at face value.

Going back to PS/SS, I thought I would like to be a student in 
Potions.  Thinking back to all of the encounters between Snape and 
Harry, Neville, Hermione, and Ron, and willing myself back to that 
first impression, I'm beginning to see something that a thoroughly
objective narrative might have mentioned, but since we only get 
Harry's impressions, it never does - Harry and Ron might just be some 
disruptive students.  Ron made a comment in CoS, I believe it was, 
that they had better things to do in Potions than listen to Snape.

!?!

Better things to do in class than listen to the teacher?  If I'd been 
even a vaguely serious student in Potions, I might not have 
appreciated having them in my class.  I know they were busy focusing 
on defeating ESE!Snape in PS/SS, and figuring out what was going
on with the petrifications in CoS.  But, class time is for learning.  
If they were doing anything else, I can certainly understand Snape 
riding them about their lessons.

I can understand him not caring for Neville blowing things up and 
melting cauldrons.

I can understand him ignoring the Know-It-All's constantly raised 
hand, and she tipped herself off by knowing about wormwood and 
asphodel in the first lesson - not even the students who had been 
raised in the WW were offering to answer.

We're only treated to Harry's take on things.  Defeating LV, in any 
shape or form, is the point of the books, and of Harry's existence.  
We understand it.  We're in his head.  But being in his head, we 
don't see how he and his friends come off from the outside.  I've
had twinges of this during the serial.  McGonagall said something 
about assigning homework anyway, despite the Grave Threat We're All 
Under.  So it isn't just Snape noticing that they're not paying 
attention in class.

And, they may be disrupting other students.  We don't know, because 
Harry doesn't realize it if it's happening.  Like my youngest playing 
her radio too loud - I'm sure the neighbors hear it, but she claims 
she needs it up that loud to hear.  Yes, her hearing's normal.  It's 
her POV that's skewed.

*Harry* thinks Snape is bullying him, so that's what we think.  We 
can't get an objective view, since when Harry is in the scene, we're 
in his head.  There is very little in the serial that doesn't involve 
Harry seeing, hearing and doing.  Only a few chapters, like the 
beginning of PS/SS, GoF, and now, HBP.  Even when the narration steps 
out of his head in order to describe a flush on his cheeks, we don't 
go very far, and it doesn't last very long.

I am no longer convinced that Snape is bullying anyone.  I am 
convinced that this is how Harry perceives it.  This is how we're 
shown it.  This is what we come away with.  The change I think it was 
Betsy mentioning, when Harry tells Snape that he doesn't have to call 
him `sir', and the immediate change in the narrative perception of 
Snape after that, is a point in favor, and part of what made me think 
of this in relation to the bullying threads.

I'm sorry this is so long!  I just want to say that what we see of 
Snape isn't necessarily what is objective.  Or Hagrid, or any other 
teacher.  Harry was influenced before he even met Snape, and 
apparently took it into the class with him.  He thought he was just 
taking notes, but he wouldn't have noticed that he seemed not to be 
listening, thereby bringing Snape's wrath down on him.

Just a discussion point.

Ceridwen.