Nightingale!Snape

[Kemper]

No: HPFGUIDX 154249

So I just finished Hans Christian Andersen's short story, 'The Nightingale'.

The plot gist:

Emperor is treated to the sound of the Nightingale, a remarkably plain
bird.  Emperor is moved.  Emperor gets a gift of a mechanical bird ornately
decorated in jewels on top of silver and gold. When wound up, it sings
almost as beautifully as the Nightingale.  The Nightingale flies away
unnoticed during the metal bird's premiere performance.  Time passes and the
hand operated bird breaks.  Years after that, the Emperor falls ill.  Death
waits by his bedside as he yells at his broken toy to work again.
Nothing.  Then out of the silence came the most beautiful song.  The
Nightingale had heard of the Emperor's suffering and had come to sing to him
-- to give him solace and hope.  Death listened to the song and urged the
Nightingale to keep singing.  Death left the Emperor's bedside, and the
Nightingale was left singing solely to the Emperor.  The Nightingale sang
him to sleep, and to strength, and to health.  The Nightingale said it would
come by in the sing in the evenings and bring joy and wisdom.  It would also
tell the emperor of the happy and the suffering, and of the good and
evil.  The Nightingale makes a request of the Emperor: Don't let anyone know
that a little bird tells you everything.

It is also notable that three of the characters in the short story are
reminded of something loved when they hear the song.

The Nightingale is remarkably plain
( for picture, see: pbc.codehog.co.uk/ report/nightingale.html )
The Nightingale heals with song.
The Nightingale says, more or less, that it will act the spy.


Now to Snape.
Though Snape has not been referred to as plain, what's remarkable is that
the reader expects certain actions from Snape's character.  I'm going to go
out on a limb and say that none of us imagined Snape singing someone to
strength and health.

Snape and Draco in the bathroom echos Fawkes and Harry in the Chamber .  But
how silly, let alone inappropriate,  would it look for Snape to bend over
Draco while squeezing out a tear?  Having Snape chant-sing is a much more
powerful image.

Bellatrix said that you have to mean an Unforgivable, that you have to
really want to cause the curse, that you have to enjoy it.  She also said an
Unforgivable cast in righteous anger wouldn't hurt her for long.

There's something about Snape's song.  It seems to be Light Magic.  Thinking
how the Unforgivables require meaning the cast, wanting the cast, and
enjoying the cast, I wonder what is required for Snape's song.  I would
guess 'meaning' and 'wanting', but 'enjoying'?  No. Compassion?  Yes.  I
wonder: could Bellatrix perform Snape's song as well as he does, or would
her attempt at it mirror Harry's failed crucio?  I suspect the later, so if
that were true, what does it say about Snape?

There's something about that song.

Phoenix.  Nightingale.  Snape.

-Kemper


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]