HeadMaster Snape & The Battle of Hogwarts

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 164761

"Steve" <bboyminn at ...> wrote:
>
> I see people are debating the merits of Snape ever
> becoming Headmaster of Hogwarts or any other school. I
> have long had a theory, and if this theory is true, Snape
> could very well become Headmaster of Hogwarts.
<snip>
> It seem clear from the very beginning that Hogwarts 
> was fair game. It was considered a strategic target in
> the battle for control of the wizard world; he who 
> controls the school controls the students, he who 
> controls the students controls the parent, and he who
> controls the parents controls the wizard world. 
> 
> Dumbledore is gone, and that represents a grave threat
> to Hogwarts security. I can't believe that Voldemort is
> so stupid he can't see that.<snip>

> So, I say Voldemort will gain control of the school, but
> Voldemort sees himself as far too important to waste his
> time dealing with a bunch of unruley students. So, 
> logically, he will appoint his own Headmaster which of 
> course will be Snape; some one experienced with, known
> to the students, and feared by them. 
> 
> Bada-Bing Bada-Boom -- Snape is Headmaster.
> 
> Which brings us to the Battle of Hogwarts, which of 
> course is actually two battles, one for Voldemort to
> capture the school and one for Harry to win it back. 
><snip>
> Now the question is, will The Final Battle of Hogwart
> represent the climax of the book, or will it just be
> a minor battle along the way? Does this provide a
> way for Snape to finally prove that he is really on
> Harry's side? 
> 
> Under these circumstances, having Snape as Headmaster
> is advantagious to Harry and to the movement of the 
> story. 
> 
Carol responds:
I really like this idea, in part because it makes Snape highly visible
and because it enables him to "slither out of action" of the
murder-and-torture variety, which would be highly detrimental to
DDM!Snape, and because it sets up an emotionally charged encounter
between Snape and Harry. Snape could even enlist the aid of the
portraits and use, say, Portrait!Phineas as an intermediary between
Hogwarts and the Order while still pretending to be loyal to Voldemort
(it's an advantage even to a superb Legilimens like Snape not to be
under Voldemort's snaky eye(s). (I considered the idea of Snape
working with his seeming rival Bellatrix to engineer a DE escape from
Azkaban, during or after which he would subvert Lucius Malfoy and a
few others to rebel against Voldemort, but I like your idea even
better because it recenters the action on Hogwarts.)

Steve:
> Still I've predicted so many battles and attacks for
> the last book, there hardly seems room for them all. 
> Attack on Privet Drive, attack at the Weasley Wedding,
> maybe an attack on Grimmauld Place, attack to capture
> Hogwarts, attack to free Hogwarts, and of course, the
> final climatic battle scene. That's a lot of battles.

Carol:
We're definitely set up for the Battle of Privet Drive on the early
morning of Harry's seventeenth birthday, but I don't think we'll see
battles in all those other locations. 12 GP is still protected by the
Fidelius Charm, and the Order will know that supposedly ESE!Snape
still can't reveal the location, so I think that will be a safe place
for the Dursleys and any other Voldie victims who were told the
location before the SK's death. Nor do I think we'll see an attack on
the Weasley wedding, which can easily be kept a secret (it would be
suicide to put an announcement in the Daily Prophet and folly to
invite Madame Maxime to fly in with her Abraxian horses. Keep it
quiet, all in the family. (Maybe we'll get Repentant!Percy now that DD
is dead.) But Hogwarts, the scene of Dumbledore's murder and the
primary setting of all the books so far, is an ideal setting for a
major battle--not the climax, which will probably involve only Harry
and a post-Nagini Voldie at the MoM, but nevertheless an important
battle midway through the book, the moment in which the promised major
deaths, or at least some of them, occur.

Carol, who doesn't expect a "bloodbath" but does interpret JKR's
unplanned deaths remark as implying planned deaths as well