Ambiguous Snape (was:Sadistic Teachers (was:Re: Teaching Styles)

[nrenka]

No: HPFGUIDX 148165

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "horridporrid03" 
<horridporrid03 at ...> wrote:

> Betsy Hp:
> Ad nauseam?  Really? 

As in, she has a continual string of these qualified statements about 
Snape, going back quite a ways in the interview archives.  (And every 
time a new one comes out, it is swiftly spun into insignificance by 
the valiant defenders.)  And as for the really obvious answers, well--
you'd be amazed (or not) what 'obvious' things listies keep doubting 
or arguing against.  I've witnessed more than one "Snape actually 
isn't genuinely unfair" argument in my time (to use what you bring up 
as an obvious statement on JKR's part).

<snip>

> ...but I doubt he's just a walking "mean teacher" cliche either.  
> There's too much tragedy in him. 

I fail to see where I've implied that Snape is only a walking mean 
teacher cliche, if that's what's being imputed.  If anything, she's 
given him more depth than "oh, he's just mean" or even "oh, he's just 
damaged" if his barbs and targeting of students are deliberate 
actions.

See, I like me some tragic!Snape.  But I also like to give him enough 
credit and agency to consider himself the primary agent and architect 
of his own personal tragedy.

<snip>

> Any evaluation of Snape's character has to include the boy Harry 
> met in his text-book.

Okay, why?  Why take it for granted that the boy Harry met in the 
textbook is *still* an essential part of Snape's character?  If you 
mean that Harry has to take that boy into account to understand 
Snape's history, then we have something like the situation with young 
Tom Riddle being the key to understanding adult Voldemort.  But just 
as Voldemort is no longer Tom Riddle, Snape is no longer the boy in 
the textbook.  Perhaps the brutal story here is precisely *that* 
Snape is no longer the boy in the textbook, who could come across as 
so sympathetic and interesting, someone who Harry would have wanted 
to have met.  Maybe the book is a representation of what has been 
lost in a sea of bitterness and unwillingness to move forwards.

There's some loose set of analogies connecting Harry, young!Snape, 
and Voldemort.  The unpleasant possibility (for your position) is 
that the Snape/Voldemort axis is the dominant one, and not the 
Snape/Harry parallelism.  Then we can shed a tear for the tragedy of 
Snape's life and his fall back into evil.  Tragic!  BANGy!  
Opportunity for the exercise of pity!

> The surface Snape has presented to Harry as his teacher doesn't 
> include it, and neither does JKR's faints and dodges in her answers 
> about Snape in her interviews.

So, does she need some smelling salts?

-Nora can't resist an opening for a pun (good-natured, natch)