CHAPDISC: HBP24, Sectumsempra

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 161351

k2listmama (Shelley) wrote:
> Maybe I didn't make my case clear. We know Snape is a double agent-
helping Dumbledore, and leading the Dark Lord to think he's still
loyal to him at the same time. Yes, it was widely known that Snape HAD
BEEN a Death Eater, but it was NOT known to everyone that he was
acting as a double agent since then. The official word to the "public"
is that Snape turned good, period, that he had "forsaken" all that was
loyal to Voldemort. I think the revelation of this book, and the
spells that Snape developed, would have cast a new light on Snape, a
new suspicion on Snape that maybe it was Snape's nature to be "dark",
not merely that he was a follower of the Dark Lord. Thus, someone
close to Snape might have watched his actions more carefully-something
that he didn't need at a time when he was tailing Draco.

Carol responds:
I don't think that the general public knew about Snape. Unlike Lucius
Malfoy, Avery, Nott, Crabbe, Goyle, Macnair, and the others Harry
mentions in GoF, whose names Fudge says were listed in the Daily
Prophet as being declared innocent because they claimed to be under
the Imperius Curse, Snape was cleared of all charges. His name would
not have been publicized, nor was Rita Skeeter present at Karkaroff's
hearing when his name was mentioned (his own hearing would have been
private as well) as she was at Ludo Bagman's. It would have been
crucial to Snape's safety and to his role as a spy that his
involvement with the Death Eaters be kept secret. Nor do I think that
the Hogwarts parents, other than the DEs, would have allowed their
children to be taught by a man they knew was a former Death Eater.
Sirius Black didn't know that Snape had been a DE, nor, it appears,
did McGonagall before Snape revealed his Dark Mark in GoF. His role as
double agent is especially effective because so few people outside the
 Death Eaters and the members of the reconstituted Order of the
Phoenix know that he was a DE, much less that he "returned" to
Voldemort on Dumbledore's orders (or in cooperation with him as part
of a longterm plan: "If you are ready; if you are prepared"). Also, if
Rita Skeeter knew, she would certainly have listed him along with
half-giant Hagrid, werewolf Lupin, and ex-Auror Moody (this is before
Fake!Moody's identity was exposed) as one of Dumbledore's questionable
hiring choices.
> 
k2listmama: 
> I see a vital difference between the cowards who quake in the Dark
Lord's wake, fearing what he would do to their families, and thus
served the Dark Lord out of fear, and those that loved what Voldemort
was doing, and so served willingly and happily. Remember what Mad Eye
Moody said- that there were many who merely claimed to be under the
Imperious Curse when they did the Dark Lord's bidding, and then
recanted when the Dark Lord fell? He said we don't know how many had
merely "changed their minds", meaning that they had once made a
willing choice to serve the big baddy. Clearly, the more dangerous
ones were the folks that served Voldemort willingly, for those might
be the folks who run back to Voldemort when the time was right, when
he had more power again, if they weren't killed first (just as Draco's
father did). 


Carol responds:
AFAWK, only two people served Voldemort entirely willingly, the
fanatics Bellatrix Lestrange and Barty Crouch Jr. (It's possible that
the Lestrange brothers, who helped Crucio the Longbottoms, also fall
into this category. We don't see enough of them to know.) And Antonin
Dolohove, who seems evil through and through, might also qualify. But
Lucius Malfoy, loyal though he seems in CoS, GoF, and OoP, claimed the
Imperius Curse to avoid Azkaban, as did the others I listed (and
Fenrir Greyback, the Carrows [Amycus and Alecto?], and Yaxley ["Brutal
Face"?], as Snape informs us in "Spinner's End." These people, even
the (IMO) irredeemably evil Greyback, seem to be more OFH! (or OFT! =
Put for Themselves) than genuinely devoted to Voldemort, who merely
provides scope for their, erm, talents--just as he does for the
Dementors. The only actual cowards that we see are Karkaroff, who rats
on his fellow DEs to get himself out of Azkaban, then runs away for
fear of retaliation, and Peter Pettigrew, who returns to Voldemort for
fear of retaliation by his former friends. 

k2listmama:
A love of Dark Arts from a young childhood would be an indication, I
think, that Snape's first term as a Death Eater was a willing 
service, and that would then be an argument for Evil!Snape, being that
you could argue that his nature didn't change. It's just a rabbit
trail on the Evil!Snape path, that's all. Or, an attempt by Rowling to
make us wonder if Snape was evil from the word go, and still is, even
if she intends to prove to us in the end that he isn't.

Carol responds:
I'm not sure what you're arguing here. Again, I'm pretty sure that the
wizarding public has or had no clue that Snape was ever a DE though,
of course, it will be all over the newspapers now. Possibly, Fudge
will testify that he had seen Snape's Dark Mark or members of the
Wizengamot or Hogwarts teachers will break their silence. (I think the
non-Hogwarts Order members will want to remain under cover.)

But if by "rabbit trail" you mean red herring, I agree. JKR wants
Harry, and the reader, to think, or suspect, the worst of Snape at the
end of the book. And yet the HBP's Potions book shows good things as
well. There's nothing sinister in the improvements to the potions
(which Harry so dishonestly took credit for), nor in most of the
spells that Teen!Snape invented. Levicorpus and the toenail hex are no
Darker than most of the hexes that the kids use on each other, and
Muffliato is quite useful. We're meant to realize that young Snape was
a genius with a dark side and yet, IMO, to sympathize with him, too.
We understand in part why he was attracted to the DEs and yet we see
affinities with Harry as well.

Carol, sure that Snape is DDM! and will prove indispensable to Harry
in Book 7