Calling Tonks Nymphadora (Re: The nature of Patronuses (Patroni?))

[houyhnhnm102]

No: HPFGUIDX 152129

T:

> In this scene, by the way, Tonks is the first 
> aggressor. Her "I sent my message to Hagrid" is 
> not very polite, is it? It shows clearly that there 
> is some animosity between them already, and IMO it's 
> aslo suggestive of her distrust in Snape (Why else 
> would she be upset that she'll have to hand Potter 
> to him instead of Hagrid? [snip}

> And Snape is just a little too nasty and cruel 
> for it to be his default behaviour to a randomly 
> picked individual from the street. He's usually 
> almost passably *civil* to grownups. At least the 
> ones that haven't shown any hostility against him. 
> But it probably doesn't take much to turn him against 
> you. He's paranoid. A slight unwilling expression of 
> distrust by tonks would have done the trick. In this 
> scene, Snape is responding to her rather offencive, 
> unnecessary and uncalled-for "I sent my message to 
> Hagrid" comment, and he's doing his cruellist for reprisal.

houyhnhnm:

That's ceratinly a reasonable interpretation.  I'll have to set it
aside to consider later.  Right now I'm having too much fun with my
own.  That scene finally makes sense to me and it's been bothering me
ever since I read HBP the first time.

"I meant Hagrid to get the message," said Tonks frowning.  That was
the right answer.  Tonks is frosted at being called Nymphadora.  Now
Snape knows it's really Tonks.  He's angry at her, not for slighting
him by sending her message to Hagrid, but for making him afraid for
nothing.  And having shown signs of "weakness" by sending a Patronus
revealing her lovelorn state.  I don't see any indication that Tonks
was reluctant to turn Harry over to Snape.  She says nothing up to the
"There is no need to wait, Nymphadora ..." and there is no physical
description of her.

But I see it that way because I've never seen Snape as someone who
enjoys inflicting pain.  I see him as someone who has some very
serious issues with fear (among other things), and therefore is
intolerant of others' weaknesses and indifferent to their feelings. 
Surely that's bad enough.