[HPforGrownups] Re: Snape, Lily & the Potions textbook

[Magpie]

No: HPFGUIDX 164853

> Alla:
> Okay, seemed like a good quote to leave in, sorry if I left out
> anything crucial.
> I am sorry, but Harry and Lily do not need to know each other? Um,
> AFAIR Harry does not know that much about her at all. I still
> maintain that whether you ( hypothetical you) consider the
> possibility of notes being Lily depends on whom you think would
> matter more in relation to book 7.

Magpie:
Harry doesn't know much about her, so nothing he does learn can be 
surprising. (He knew a bit more about James, and it was exactly what he knew 
that got subverted in the Pensieve.)

Finding out that Lily was somebody he thought he would like upon reading her 
notes is nice, but not particularly interesting. He's just finding out his 
mother, whom he already thinks is fantasic without having met her, is truly 
fantastic. That's not anywhere near as satisfying as the surprise that this 
boy (whom Harry instinctively knew he was a boy and canon so far validated 
that impression) that he made into a special friend was actually someone he 
hated. Also the HBP's personality can be related to Snape's--we can easily 
"see" Snape in the HBP and vice versa now.

Although I just realized I'm actually ignoring the main way that it is 
dramatic, because it seems like people often split the notes between Lily 
(Potions improvements) and Snape (Dark Arts). If the notes are Lily's she's 
the one creating dark and violent spells.

Alla:
>
> Why exactly Harry can only learn about something crucial about Lily
> which is related to Snape, if that is whay you are saying? As you
> know I do think that they had a connection and yes, it is likely
> that Harry would look at Snape through her eyes, but cannot HBP be
> just another piece of the puzzle about his mum, **not** about Snape?

Magpie:
I wouldn't say he can only learn things about Lily through Snape--I don't 
think JKR is locked into that. But Lily isn't a puzzle that Harry's looking 
at pieces for. If Lily was the Potions half of the HBP that's just 
straightforward information that doesn't contradict anything or add to 
anything any more than Slughorn telling us she was cheeky and good at 
Potions and pretty does. (If she's all the notes then there's the technical 
issue of Snape having claimed to be the HBP, and it being Snape's book, and 
creating Sectumsempra and the spell used on him).

Alla:
> I do not get why not. Not dramatic enough? Again, yes, the reversal
> with Snape seemed dramatic enough, for sure, but who knows maybe
> reveal with Lily would be even more dramatic  and somehow connected
> to the book.

Magpie:
I would never say there's no way JKR *couldn't* come up with a dramatic 
story around the voice in the book being Lily alone because hey, who am I to 
predict what the woman could do! But that would be at the expense of 
throwing out the story she wrote in HBP. Harry can go on defending the HBP.

Alla:
 Again, I do not insist that the notes were Lily's, it can totally be
> Snape's but the idea that it cannot be just because it will diminish
> Harry/Snape connection amuses me and I do not agree with it at all.

Magpie:
Do you mean because the Harry/Snape hatred is already so intense it doesn't 
need the addition of Harry feeling tricked into liking him as the HBP? I 
guess I would agree with that--Harry doesn't need to have bonded with the 
HBP to feel strongly about Snape! But the HBP storyline does seem to slot 
easily into that dynamic and say things about both characters.

If it's Lily responsible for all that stuff that could certainly be 
dramatic-but in a way that makes me think "Why on earth wasn't Lily 
introduced as a character sooner?" Because...Lily created violent Dark Magic 
spells that almost led to a death by Harry's hand? A spell she created to be 
used on "enemies?" And her Levicorpus spell is being used by DEs?

I know JKR tends to layer people and give them contradictions, but it seems 
like we're going to need more than one book to deal with the Dark Mother 
that is Lily in this scenario. She's sounding a bit Galadriel under the 
power of the Ring!

-m