[HPforGrownups] Harry's Transition Hating Snape to Not Hating Snape (was 7 reasons why - The Glass is Half Empty)

Wed Aug 8 23:44:57 UTC 2007

No: HPFGUIDX 174865

 Shelley:
[snip] 
>Again, it's not about the letter- it's about the letter, Snape's memories, 
>maybe a pep talk with Dumbledore about it, the insight into Harry's thoughts 
>of reflection to show his change in thinking- there's a lot wrong or missing 
>with that transition. She didn't make us feel it too, she didn't let those 
>of us who thought Snape was pure evil or out for himself to really come 
 >around and have that change in thought with Harry, so that we could share 
 >his fond memory of Snape years later.
 [snip]

Please don't speak for me ... I was of those who, by the end of HBP, thought Snape was out for himself -- loyal neither to Voldemort nor Dumbledore; loyal only to Snape.  (I wanted him to be loyal to Dumbledore, but couldn't quite believe it.  As a fictional character I love his complexity and ambiguity, but I could find very little to like about him.)  However, I easily came around in DH and was able to "share [Harry's] fond memory of Snape..."

First of all -- I don't want to get hung up on the letter -- really I don't -- but I do not place nearly the importance on it that others do.  Taken on face value the first time we see it, it is not a clue to Snape's loyalty to Dumbledore (as you asserted in a piece I snipped) -- if anything its a clue as to Dumbledore's less-than-perfect  past.  Given the fact that the room Harry found it in was ransacked and given the number of years ago it was written, my simple mind could easily write off the missing second page.  (Sometimes JKR gives us Details -- which foreshadow -- and sometimes she just give us details --- which completes the scene or titillates.  And considering the second page completed Lily's thought about Dumbledore and Rita Skeeter has us curious about Dumbledore's past, the letter does indeed titillate.  Had we never seen it again, it nevertheless served a purpose.)

That said, I think Harry and I go through a similar transition from vilifying to revering Snape.  However, since a part of me wants him to be a "good guy," I'm more open to the possibility and therefore I get there a little bit before Harry does.

My first step is in Chapter 15, The Goblin's Revenage, when we learn that Snape punished Ginny, Neville, and Luna by sending "them into the Forbidden Forest, to do some work for the oaf, Hagrid."  Harry's reaction is the same as mine ("...Snape might've thought that was punishment...but Ginny, Neville, and Luna probably had a good laugh with Hagrid...") (p. 302 US)  However, unlike Harry, I wonder if perhaps Snape doesn't really think that is punishment at all, but chose it because he knew that others would.  At this point, I decide to start giving him the benefit of the doubt (whereas after chapters 1 and 5, I'm afraid that he really is the "bad guy" I suspected he was).

The second step in my transition occurs in Chapter 19, The Silver Doe.  I just knew that that Patronus belonged to Snape -- it was logical to me:  James's animagus form was a stag, Lily was his wife, the mate of a stag is a doe; I suspected something between Lily and Snape, therefore, since we know both James and Lily are dead, the Patronus must belong to someone else who loved her -- Snape.  (I first suspected something back in the beginning of OOTP when Petunia mentioned that awful boy talking about dementors -- I don't have my copy of the book so I'm paraphrasing -- for whatever reason, I never consider the boy was James. That suspicion grew after reading Snape's Worse Memory in OOTP -- Snape calling Lily a mudblood was too hurtful -- you can only be hurt by those you care about and all that.  I didn't know what was between them -- friendship, puppy love, unrequited love, but I suspected something.  And, of course, JKR dropped a vague or two.)  So, at that point, I'm
 willing to accept that Snape probably is a good guy after all.

Harry, of course, doesn't make the connection between the doe and Snape that I and many others do.  Nevertheless, he recognizes the doe as a Patronus ("..or was the doe, which he had taken to be a Patronus..." p.368 US) and fully accepts her and her help without question -- "He felt that he had been waiting for her to come, but that he had forgotten, until this moment, that they had arranged to meet...He knew, he would have staked his life on it, that she had come for him, and him alone." (p. 366 US)  And he accepts that someone is helping him. ("Whoever cast the Patronus must have put [the sword] there." p. 373 US)

The next step comes in Chapter 30, The Sacking of Severus Snape.  Umm ... just realized something ... at the sight of Snape, "Hatred boiled up in Harry at the sight of him..." (p. 597)  Giiven all the debate over Harry's use of the Cruciatus Curse only a few pages before, it's interesting that we don't see the supposedly morally deficient Harry raise his wand beneath his Invisibility Cloak and use his newly acquired skill against this man who he hates so much.  I'm sure that that can't be because he knows its wrong to torture and perhaps doesn't want to repeat his lapse in judgment.  I'm sorry I digress ...

To get back to my point, when McGonagall attacks Snape, Snape, whom we know knows some pretty nasty spells, uses mainly defensive spells. I have no doubt he could have seriously harmed McGonagall before the other professors arrived if he wanted to or that he could have taken out Flitwick or Sprout or both  before he fled.  Of course, Harry, a witness to the confrontation between his old professors, still isn't as for along as I am in accepting Snape as a probable good guy.  In fact I'm sure he agrees when McGonagall cries, "Coward!  Coward!" to the retreating Snape.  (Poor Severus; twice now he's been run out of Hogwarts with people calling him coward.)

Then, Harry witnesses the exchange between Voldemort and Snape in the Shrieking Shack in Chapter 32, The Elder Wand" and watches as Nagini attacks Snape on Voldemort's command.  Then, after Voldemort leaves, as Snape lays dying,  "As quietly as he could, [Harry] pulled himself up into the room...He did not know why he was doing it, why he was approaching the dying man: He did not know what he felt as he saw Snape's white face, and the fingers trying to staunch the bloody wound at his neck.  Harry took off the Invisibility Cloak and looked down upon the man he hated..." (p. 657) and he took possession of the memories Snape offered him.  Harry has to be wondering, "why was Snape so intent on finding me?  Why is he giving me -- the boy who violated his privacy by viewing his memories in a pensieve without permission -- memories now?  What's so important that he is doing this as he dies?  I believe at this moment, Harry is starting to wonder about Snape and his own beliefs
 about the man.  Maybe here he starts to see not the cruel teacher, not the Death Eater, not the murderer, but the student who wrote notes in the margins of his potions book, whom Harry once thought was brilliant and cool, and the man that Dumbledore insisted that he trusted.  If he previous convictions about Snape were so strong here, I believe he would have walked away.

So then, we see Harry view Snape's memories in Chapter 33, The Prince's Tale (interesting that the chapter title harkens back to the boy who wrote in the margins).  We and Harry together see a childhood friendship between Snape and Lily, we see Snape apologizing to Lily for calling her a mudblood (I wonder what Snape would have said if Lily hadn't cut him off and walked away?), we see Snape afraid and remorseful as he tells Dumbledore that Voldemort means to kill Lily, we see Snape mourning Lily's death wishing he were dead, we see Snape agreeing to protect Lily's son while begging Dumbledore not to tell anyone ("My word, Severus, that I shall never reveal the best of you?"), we see Snape's indignation when Dumbledore tells him that Lily's son must die (and don't we feel more than a little betrayed by and angry at Dumbledore too?), and we see him leave with the sword and we see his doe Patronus (the same Patronus that brought Harry the sword -- the Patronus that seemed so
 familiar -- perhaps it was familiar because of its connection to two people who have protected him, not just one) and we know that Snape has loved Lily for the past 30 years (give or take).  (And the fact the second page of the letter shows up is no more that a "ah ha -- that's what happened to it" moment for me.)

Everything that Harry believes about Snape is tossed out the window by those memories.  Um, not unlike everything he believed about Sirius was tossed out the window when he learned the truth about who really was his parents' Secret Keeper.  Bottomline: He learns the truth and with knowledge comes forgiveness.

We see tangible evidence that Harry sees Snape differently during his 'Snape was Dumbledore's man' speech to Voldemort (in front of witnesses) and, of course, again when we learn his second son's middle name is Severus.  Since we see Harry tell the truth about Snape as he faces off against Voldemort, I think we can be assured that he continued telling that truth over the years.

I actually like how JKR resolved the Harry/Snape issue -- As I have said before in other threads, I would have found a Hallmark moment between them far-fetched and therefore totally unbelievable given their past relationship.  And let's remember that Harry is processing all this new information he receives about Snape in a very short period of time -- he had seven years to form his initial opinions.

Christy

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