16 years of teaching at Hogwarts? (wasRe: Copyediting Errors - Listed?)

[houyhnhnm102]

No: HPFGUIDX 157259

> Carol, who's also confused as to how having Draco 
> complete his assigned task (killing DD) would give Snape 
> a little more time to spy at Hogwarts since there would 
> be no one left to spy on except McGonagall and Flitwick, 
> neither of whom seems particularly important to the Order

houyhnhnm:

One of the reasons I thought Snape did not know the nature of Draco's 
task when the sisters came to call.

My view is that Snape knew Voldemort was up to something that he was 
keeping Snape in the dark about.  Snape was desperate to get that 
information and so took the dangerous gamble of agreeing to the UV.  
Other see the UV as proof that Snape is really on LV's side and there 
are many convoluted theories (none of which I really understand) about 
why a DDM or OFH Snape would take the vow, knowing what it entailed.  
But I think everyone agrees that it was a Bad Idea.

If Snape was in over his head playing the double agent game, if 
desperation was undermining his judgement and making him careless, 
then slipping up in front of Bella with the "sixteen years" would be 
consistant with that.  The chapter isn't called "Spinner's End" for 
nothing.

On the other hand, it *could* be Rowling's slip up. We seem to be 
racking up an awful lot of them, though.