Is Snape good or evil? (longer)

[lupinlore]

No: HPFGUIDX 148832


<SNIP> 
> 
> Nora:
> > There's always the BANG of JKR finally slamming the door on the 
> > question of guilt. ;)  (Not the BANG you wanted?)
> 
> Pippin:
> But the door's already nailed shut, as far as Harry's concerned. If
> Snape is in fact guilty, all that's left of DDM!Snape is the pfffft 
> of deflating expectations and the fizzle of extinguished hopes. 
> Not much of a bang there.

You are quite right, however I don't see why that is an objection to 
what Nora is saying.  Whatever JKR does will destroy one view of 
Snape or another.  Why should the hopes of DDM!Snapers be privileged 
over the theories of OFH!Snapers or the expectations of ESE!Snapers?  
Many OFH!Snapers hold that Snape's guilt makes for an extremely 
plausible and satisfying revelation.  ESE!Snapers feel that Snape's 
guilt is a very believable scenario that brings his actions and 
attitudes into logical clarity after six books of murky and 
contradictory messages.  There are people in both camps who hold that 
DDM!Snape, far from being a profound revelation that deepens the plot 
and characters, would simply be a cheap trick -- in essence JKR 
painting herself into a corner and then getting herself out again 
with a great deal of forced and unbelievable hand-waving.

I understand your point that Snape's guilt in this instance isn't 
very bangy.  I guess my reply is "So what?"  Not every answer to 
every question has to be some profound revelation that sends the plot 
and characters off in bold new directions.  In fact, such twists 
don't necessarily deepen characters -- they often cheapen them by 
making the characters psychologically unbelievable and the plot 
annoyingly and unnecessarily baroque, in effect just vehicles for a 
self-indulgent author bent on playing a perpetual game of Gotcha!


<SNIP> 
> 
> Pippin:
> But how can it?  It won't be a painful experience for Harry unless 
> he's ashamed of what James and Sirius were up to -- one imagines 
> that Fred and George would be delighted to discover that their old 
> Dad had been in one scrape after another. What it bespeaks is that
> Snape no longer assumes Harry would think his father was an "amusing
> man." In fact, Snape's attitude towards Harry must have changed 
> significantly since OOP.
> 

Why must it have changed significantly?  Does Snape show any sympathy 
for Harry whatsoever?  Does he cease going out of his way to taunt 
Harry?  No.  In fact he goes WELL out of his way during the Welcome 
Feast to be just as nasty as ever.  

In fact, the idea that Snape must have changed in his attitudes is 
based, it seems, on the assumption that Snape must have a consistent 
and logical view of Harry and Harry's mental relationship with James 
and Sirius.  That doesn't make Snape a deeper character or a more 
believable one.  In fact it makes him very shallow.  Why should Snape 
have a logical and consistent view of Harry?  Real people often don't 
have logical and consistent views of other people, particularly other 
people about whom they have strong feelings.  The idea here seems to 
be that Snape must think that Harry either would celebrate his 
father's sins or would be ashamed of them.  I don't think that's very 
realistic.  I see no reason that Snape could not believe fervently 
both that Harry would be ashamed of his father's actions and that 
Harry would celebrate his father's actions.  Vulcans and computers 
can't hold mutually contradictory ideas with equal fervor, but humans 
do it all the time.  

What it comes down to is that Snape just flat dislikes Harry, and he 
will use whatever rationalization/defense/mental buttressing for that 
dislike that lies at hand and seems to work in any given moment.  He 
happened to have a set of old detention cards and thought "Potter 
will be ashamed" because in that circumstance the idea that Harry 
would be ashamed supported his intense dislike of the boy, at least 
in the roundabout way of giving him pleasure through hurting Harry.  
In another instance, say if Lupin were to mention something about 
Harry and Sirius, I'm sure Snape would snarl "I have no doubt that 
Potter thinks of Black and James Potter as paragons of virtue!" 
because in THAT instance the idea that "Harry will support his 
father's actions" gives rationalization to Snape's dislike.

Here is where I firmly agree with Nora that Dumbledore is an 
emotional moron.  Anyone with even a modicum of emotional wisdom 
would readily recognize that Snape simply has a fundamental dislike 
for Harry and no amount of new knowledge or opportunity to learn 
about Harry will shake his views.  Yet, at least until the end of 
OOTP, Dumbledore seems to believe that given time and exposure to 
Harry, including maybe the forced intimacy of occlumency, Snape will 
change.  But that just isn't the way people are, and Dumbledore's 
moronic ignorance of that fact has led to complete disaster.


Lupinlore