High Noon for OFH!Snape

[nrenka]

No: HPFGUIDX 149454

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

> Magpie:
>
> Snape more has the arrogance of the resentful geek, imo.

Let me simply interject to note that I'm personally wary of labels 
such as 'geek' (and by implication, 'jock' and other fellow 
travelers) in the Potterverse.  They have such definite overtones for 
most of us of American high school, but I'm not sure that's a good 
model.  It doesn't ring true for me in the social structure of 
Hogwarts, and it can tend to bring out some strange models of 
identification with characters.

> He knows he's smarter than others a lot of the time, but resents 
> feeling he's overlooked in favor of the stars.  I'm remembering him 
> getting so wound up by Crouch!Moody suggesting Dumbledore didn't 
> trust him.  It seems like Snape's always in that position. Doing 
> something stupid to "show them all" I can see much more than taking 
> this kind of risk since he already is insecure about how people 
> think of him.

I see Snape's arrogance in a slightly different streak: he's very, 
very sure of himself to the point of refusing to hear or admit other 
viewpoints.  The classic example of this is during his rage in PoA, 
both in the Shack itself and afterwards.  A forgiving reading is that 
he's so upset he's lost reason, but it does reveal something 
interesting: I think he feels deeply *threatened* by the idea that 
his constructed paradigm could turn out to be wrong.  He's so certain 
about Black and Lupin being guilty that he refuses to consider 
evidence that they may not be, leading to his public meltdown at the 
end of the book.

The same thing seems to be going on with Harry and Snape's somewhat 
delusional POV in that area.  As Lupinlore posted a while back, 
Dumbledore seems to have had the idea that exposing Snape and Harry 
to each other would lead to realizations, particularly Snape figuring 
out that Harry is not James the Younger.  As argued before ad 
nauseam, that doesn't seem to have worked out.  (One might also add 
in his style of running the DADA class in PoA, which is intended to 
shut down argument or any feedback from students--that's part of why 
the kappa thing is so funny...)

A charitable reading of Snape's actions regarding the Vow could 
involve this kind of arrogance, the idea that he knows what's going 
on when everyone else is deluding themselves--and that desire to do 
what no one else can do, to be the spy of spies and successfully fool 
the agents of Voldemort, is what brings him down into the trap and 
forces him to do what he really doesn't want to do.  First-rate 
Aristotelian tragedy.  Not as much fun as the real thing, but...

-Nora is fully capable of being charitable on special occasions