I HAD A DREAM OR HOW I REALIZED THAT I MAY HAVE BEEN WRONG./ PART 2 sort of

[pippin_999]

No: HPFGUIDX 167080

> 
> Neri:
> I never got the impression Snape *hesitated*. I fact it seems to me
> that JKR precisely contrasts his behavior with that of Draco. Snape
> takes exactly half a page from bursting in to doing the deed. Unlike
> the talkative Draco he says nothing at all to Dumbledore or to anybody
> else except "Avada Kedavra!" Before that he merely "gazes for a
> moment" with hatred at the pleading Dumbledore, exactly the dramatic
> pause that would be appropriate before the most fateful murder of the
> series, you know.

Pippin:
So, um, Snape's dramatic pause means he's *not* acting? How do you
work that out?  There's no  dramatic pause before the killing of 
Cedric or Sirius. Canon makes it wonderfully clear: killers don't pause for 
drama, *actors* do.


> 
> Neri:
> I agree. If Snape is to be DDM then there wasn't a murder on the tower
> and Dumbledore had never asked Snape to kill him. Not that I think
> Snape is DDM, but *if* he is, then complete and absolute innocence is
> the only solution that would be dramatic enough after the tower. I
> think Rushdie has also realized this, which was why he was so sure
> that Dumbledore couldn't be dead. The problem is that Dumbledore *is*
> dead, and a botched ruse would most certainly not be dramatic enough.

Pippin:
Not dramatic enough for what?  Harry's horrible, shocked realization
that the prejudice he thought he was too noble to feel led him to 
accuse  an innocent man of murder, and that he himself fed Dumbledore 
the poison that killed him -- that's plenty dramatic, even without
any further damage to Snape at Harry's hands, which I'm sure will
happen before Harry discovers the truth.

And there will be plenty of dramatic interest in Snape if the reader
realizes that he must be innocent before Harry does. Will Snape
escape Harry's vengeance? If he does, how will Harry ever learn the
truth? And so on.

Neri: 
> What I'm surprised at, Pippin, is that you haven't yet blamed
> Dumbledore's murder on ESE!Lupin (unless you have and I've missed it,
> in this case my apologies).

Pippin:
Oh no, I think Lupin's shock and horror at Dumbledore's death
are quite genuine. He never meant Dumbledore to die -- he assumed,
like everyone else, that Draco would be incapable of killing and
that Dumbledore could easily dispose of any threat that Draco
posed. But if ESE!Lupin was Draco's minder, responsible for putting 
Rosmerta under Imperius, for making sure that Voldemort's  threats
reached their target, and for assembling the raiding party, then 
yes, he  may be responsible for Dumbledore's death, if  the necessity of
getting the raiding party out of the castle  meant that Snape
couldn't be spared to heal Dumbledore of the poison. 

Anway, ESE!Lupin does have an alibi: he was Stupefying the DE
left on the tower (whom Harry had only frozen) so that he could steal 
Harry's abandoned invisibility cloak, and use it to smuggle 
Fenrir Greyback out of the castle. :)


Neri:
of course I don't think Lupin is ESE, but it's still
> easier for me to buy than Dumbledore asking Snape to kill him, or
> Dumbledore faking his own death and botching it.  

Pippin:
It's not that Dumbledore botches it, except that the DE raid forced
him to fake his death at a  time when only Snape's healing skills 
might have allowed him to survive. 

He could have dropped the plan to fake his death and asked Snape to 
attempt to heal him, but that would have thrown out any plans that 
involved Voldemort believing that Snape was indeed a traitor to 
Dumbledore. 

Pippin