The Unloved Son (was Re: Could I be wrong about Snape being evil?)

[wynnleaf]

No: HPFGUIDX 156665


> wynnleaf
> I've seen some fan fic writers do an excellent job at writing 
Snape 
> from the perspective of sybling rivalry hatred for Harry.  It 
> primarily seems to work if Snape is portrayed as especially 
> emotionally immature.  

> Sherry now:
> 
> Breaking my vow to myself never to debate Snape again, since none 
of us will
> ever change each other's minds, ... however, the thing I would 
never say of
> Snape is that he is emotionally mature. 

wynnleaf
I meant exactly what I said: "*especially* emotionally immature."  I 
agree that Snape probably lacks maturity in his attitude toward 
Harry (I say "probably" based on the assumption that he truly does 
hate Harry.)

Sherry
 To me, a man who hates a child, an
> 11-year-old child, on sight, from the very beginning, based solely 
on who
> that child's father just happened to be, well, that's the complete 
opposite
> of emotional maturity.  it's immature in the extreme, I think. 

wynnleaf (speaking earlier of the immaturity of sibling rivalry)
This works well, until Snape has to be 
> portrayed in his ongoing work as a spy, having to make difficult 
> decisions, having to stay very focused and keep emotions in check, 
> etc.  At that point, that degree of immaturity no longer seems to 
> fit the character.  

wynnleaf
And there's the problem -- just how emotionally immature can a 
person be and still carry on -- even as a 19 or 20 year old -- as a 
spy against a Voldemort who's also a master at legilimency?  Snape 
had to be able to deceive Voldemort, his old DE associates, *and* 
their children in Slytherin for many years.  During the years 
between GOF and the end of HBP, he has to carry on the extremely 
dangerous work of a spy with Voldemort, take care of Slytherin 
House, teach, attempt (sort of) to teach Harry occlumency, *and* 
work on various other duties for DD, not to mention having to dog 
Draco's footsteps trying to figure out what he's up to.  And he 
spent the last year of it under an Unbreakable Vow which was further 
endangering his life, while he watched Dumbledore who he cares about 
deeply (in our current discussion/view of Snape suffering sibling 
rivalry) living under constant threat of death.  And all that 
without cracking under the strain, without making major mistakes 
(well, there was the Vow), and without breaking his cover.  No, he's 
not *that* emotionally immature, or he'd never have pulled it off.

Sherry, 
 If Snape is
> so emotionally mature, he should be able to realize that Harry is 
not James,
> and that Harry has no more control over who his parents were than 
does
> Snape. 

wynnleaf
I agree that there's a level of immaturity there.  However, I'm 
interested to note that when DD speaks in OOTP of Snape's inability 
to get over his feelings about James, DD says that "some wounds go 
too deep for healing."  DD does *not* indicate that Snape was being 
petty in his hatred for James.  We readers often think of it as a 
school boy's grudge, but that's not really how DD characterized it 
when he spoke of the depth of the wound.

Sherry
 Even in the horrid occlumency lessons, Snape got a glimpse of
> Harry's childhood, but this did not seem to cause him to begin to 
rethink
> his attitudes toward Harry.  Yet when Harry saw the pensieve 
memory, he did
> feel compassion for the young Severus.  Who's more emotionally 
mature now?

wynnleaf
We know Harry's feelings of sympathy because we get to see inside 
his head.  He didn't actually *act* any differently toward Snape.  
We have no knowledge of what Snape really thought about what he saw 
of Harry's past, only that he didn't act any differently afterward --
 but then neither did Harry.

Sherry
> Maybe, due to his spying role, for whoever is really his master, 
he can keep
> his emotions in check.  He must or die.  But when he lets them 
out, he sure
> lets them out and blows everything to pieces with them.  Speaking
> figuratively, of course.  But that scene in the shrieking shack in 
POA,
> followed by the hospital wing scene was one of the biggest out and 
out
> temper tantrums I've ever read, especially coming from a 
supposedly mature
> man.

wynnleaf
Snape seemed to be the only one in the Shrieking Shack who was 
actively aware that there was a werewolf about to transform in the 
room.  Think about it from his perspective.  He comes into the room 
having only heard about the animagi information -- nothing about 
Pettigrew being alive.  He sees who he thinks is a mass murderer 
accompanied by Lupin who he has just heard confess to knowledge 
about Black that Lupin never, in the past 9 months, told 
Dumbledore.  So naturally his suspicions that Lupin was in league 
with Black seem affirmed.  So there's the mass murderer, his 
accomplice, Lupin, about to transform into a werewolf, a child with 
a badly broken leg, and two other students -- all of whom want to go 
back to a nice long *discussion*, of all things, utterly ignoring 
the fact that if Lupin turned into a werewolf, the only one who'd be 
safe would be Black, the animagus. (I don't include Peter, since 
Snape didn't know he was there.) 

So Snape gets furious -- he hates Sirius anyway and saw him as the 
person who attempted to get him (Snape) killed, the traitor who 
helped get the Potter's killed, and personally killed a lot of other 
people, and is now in league with a werewolf who's about to 
transform.  And everyone in the Shrieking Shack is acting like Snape 
is so immature and not getting over a school boy grudge because he 
won't stop and have a nice long revealing chat.  (I'm trying to tell 
this a bit from Snape's probably perspective).  I can understand his 
fury.

wynnleaf