Snape Loved or In-Love with Lily?

[Tonks]

No: HPFGUIDX 148450

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Sydney" <sydpad at ...> wrote:
>> 
> The black-swathed ambiguous guy tortured but ennobled by his 
unspoken passion for the lily-white heroine-- what's not to love?  
So it's a romantic, corny cliche that went out with the horse-and-
buggy.  
(snip, snip, snip)> 
> -- Crack investigative journalist Jeremy Paxman smells a rat, and 
that's good enough for me:
> 
> JEREMY PAXMAN: Are we going to discover anything more about Snape
> ?
> JK ROWLING: Yes.
> JEREMY PAXMAN: And Harry's mother? Did he have a crush on Harry's
> mother or unrequited love or anything like that?
> JK ROWLING: Hence his animosity to Harry?
> JEREMY PAXMAN: Yes.
> JK ROWLING: You speculate?
> JEREMY PAXMAN: I speculate, yes, I'm just asking whether you can
> tell us.
> JK ROWLING: No I can't tell you.

Tonks:
Very good post. You are starting to convince me. I thought it was 
silly that someone would be that hooked on a crush from their teens, 
but maybe.  Usually you are in love one week and out the next when 
you are that young. 

I never could see the grudge of two teenagers being of any 
importance to a man in his late 30's.  That makes no sense either. A 
sensible man like Snape would have moved beyond that long ago.

But I have made the mistake of thinking about Snape as the mature 
man that we see before us and not as a young 20 year old.  So 
looking back in time to Snape at 20 what do we see?  We have the 
fresh memory of Snape's hatred for James and Sirius and maybe Lupin 
by association.  We may have strong feeling for Lily and unrequited 
love coupled with the object of his affection marrying the young man 
he hates.  Not only that, but Lily marries the same young man that 
Snape has a life debt too.  So perhaps all of it mixed together is 
what we are looking for. It is not just Snape's feeling towards 
Lily.  Not just his hatred of James.  Not just his life debt to 
James. But the whole package and all of the multifaceted dimensions 
of it in its entirety.

Picture it: A young man of 20 not that long out of school, still 
feeling the stings of rejection at school and the hatred of James, 
seeing the young woman that he secretly loved marry the man that he 
hates.  Having a life debt that ties him to James in a way that 
prevents Snape from moving on and forgetting James.  All of this 
pulling him to the dark side.  Then Snape overhears the prophesy 
only to find later that it comes back to bite him.  The two people 
he would have wanted to forget are right in the middle of it all.  
And to top it all off, now Snape is in a bad way with the life debit 
that he has with James. This would be a rather traumatic event for a 
young man, or anyone for that matter.  It would make Snape a bitter 
person, and a person with enough remorse to turn from the dark side 
and repent.  Snape would be haunted by the memory of this whole 
thing.  

Later Snape is at Hogwarts locked away in his dungeon, enjoying his 
potions making and perhaps secret experiments, being able to some 
extent forget the events of his youth.  Then Harry comes to Hogwarts 
and when Snape sees him it all comes flooding back.  Snape feels the 
trauma all over again, he is reminded of his sins, he feels the 
guilt and remorse that he thought he had overcome with the years.  
He hates Harry for bringing back these memories.  

And there you have it
  

Tonks_op