Snape, Lily & the Potions textbook

[Unspeakable]

No: HPFGUIDX 164892

Very interesting discussion!

It's amazing what can grow from a throwaway remark on these boards. :--)

Just to clarify a few things in my last post and to respond to some
new ideas:

a) Carol: Are you taking Slughorn's comments about Lily's natural
Potions ability to indicate
that Severus's genius wasn't equally natural? 

Cassy: No, my point here was just to acknowledge that *all* geniuses
are made as well as born (good examples, btw)! I think it was being
argued by some that the 'many revisions and crossings out' in the
Prince's textbook contradicted the idea of instinctive ability. (The
implication being that Slughorn had exaggerated Lily's 'intuitive
grasp of Potions making'.) Now obviously, *Harry's* 'instinct' was no
such thing! No-one could have achieved such spectacular results first
time. But from what Slughorn said, Lily possessed the ability to
improvise in Potions. And I just think it's interesting that Slughorn
repeatedly mentions her *creative* brilliance. 

I mean, don't you think that Slughorn could have been pleasantly
surprised by Harry's skill, "but then your mother was a very good
student, delightful girl, Lily Evans", while leaving us in no doubt
that Snape was the *outstanding* one (with Lily as his Hermione)? But
it seems that they were both outstanding ... only there's no payoff
for Lily's talent in HBP, which leaves me feeling slightly cheated on
her behalf. (Maybe, Charming!Lily was just a plot device to gain the
memory from Slughorn, but surely Charming!Lily didn't have to be
*that* good at Potions? Unless we're meant to assume that Slughorn was
exaggerating because he liked her face. And that would be *his*
sexism, right?! I'd rather believe that Snape & Lily were partners.)

b) Magpie: I think that Slughorn was perfectly serious when he said
that Lily was good at Potions, and that this could be a connection she
had to Snape. Snape could have admired Lily's Potions skill too. What
I don't see any evidence for is the leap that Slughorn says Lily was
good at Potions means that Lily must be person good at Potions Harry
learned from in HBP. That, to me, seems like an odd leap, and one that
leads nowhere. Harry already knows Lily was good at Potions ... It
just doesn't interest [him] much.

Cassy: But isn't *that* odd? Odd, I mean, that Lily's talent should be
of such little consequence. Odd too, that we have evidence to suggest
that Lily & Snape were both fabulously gifted at Potions (Slughorn
described Lily as one of the brightest students he'd ever taught) when
they were probably in the same N.E.W.T. class and no-one in Harry's
world has even mentioned the possibility that they might have been
working together. Now that is odd, IMHO! 

As for the 'odd leap' you mention, I don't think it's so strange when
everything Harry does in Potions seems to remind Slughorn of Lily.
Granted, Slughorn is not going to suppose that Harry inherited any
talent from Snape, but why does Slughorn need to *keep* referencing
Lily at all? If she was just decent at Potions, but her son appears to
be brilliant, then one might have thought he would let it drop after a
couple of lessons and start praising Harry in his own right? Instead,
it's almost like Slughorn is experiencing déjà vu! "Unorthodox, but
what a stroke of inspiration, Harry ... I really don't know where you
get these brain waves, my boy ... unless ... it's just your mother's
genes coming out in you!" Even the trick  with the bezoar strikes him
as something Lily would have done: "You've got a nerve, boy! ... Oh,
you're like your mother ... well, I can't fault you ... a bezoar would
certainly act as an antidote to all these potions!" And then again:
"That's the individual spirit a real potion-maker needs!" said
Slughorn happily, before Harry could reply. "Just like his mother, she
had the same intuitive grasp of potion making, it's undoubtedly from
Lily he gets it..." (HBP18) (One has to wonder where Snape *was* when
Lily was impressing Slughorn - sitting next to her, perhaps?)

c) Carol: how does crediting *Lily* with Severus's Potions
improvements help to improve Harry's estimation of Snape's abilities?
... In any case, he's never doubted Snape's Potions
abilities.

Cassy: That was my point. :--)

d) Carol: But to give her [Lily] credit for Snape's brilliance in
Potions ... is to take away all
the beautiful irony of Harry's learning Potions from Snape without
knowing he's Snape and identifying with the young Severus without
knowing who he was.

Cassy: You make a good point. But there's still the irony of Harry
learning DADA from Snape via the Prince ... and I'm not saying that
Snape wasn't involved with the Potions improvements, but that he &
Lily might have collaborated, which would also be ironic given that
Harry currently believes Snape *hated* his mother. "And he didn't
think my mother was worth a damn either because she was
Muggle-born.... 'Mudblood,' he called her...." (HBP29).

e) Magpie: Which doesn't mean that Lily can't be connected to the
book. I mean, Harry's relationship with Lily has potential, but it's
not yet in any way complicated. Harry thinks Lily's great and learning
she was good at Potions and helped him at Potions doesn't really give
him anything except that hey, Mum was good at Potions.

Cassy: I agree. What *would* be interesting, IMHO, would be for Harry
to discover that his mother had a relationship with the Half-Blood
Prince, which I think is (partly) the significance of the textbook.
Why would Harry's actions be making Slughorn think of Lily when he was
following Snape's instructions?

Magpie: The HBP being Snape is a turnaround and dramatic -- Harry's
freaked out by the idea the person he came to think of as a friend was
his most hated enemy. 

Cassy: Although my point is that all this ultimately achieves is
another opportunity for Harry to convict Snape at the end of HBP. He
decides that the Prince showed a predisposition for evil & that he
(Harry) was a fool not to have seen it before.  Thus, the book becomes
something of a red herring for those who believe in DDM!Snape.
Somehow, Harry has to realize that Snape is actually on his side. Now,
I don't think that the Potions book will achieve this ... (I doubt
that the book will play a particularly important role in DH) ... but
it might just contain the only evidence we have of a Snape/Lily
friendship. 

f) Alla, thinks that Lily making those notes would have a layer of new
and delightful irony. 

Magpie: She's the type of person Harry thinks the voice *should*
belong to, so isn't ironic. And in
fact it seems to require a convenient dual personality for the HBP.
Instead of being the complicated person whom Harry liked but had a
dark side, he's comfortably split into the Dark Side being the guy
he's always hated and the part he liked being somebody he loves. 

Cassy: Well, if Snape invented the spells (some of which Harry found
very useful) and Snape & Lily were *both* responsible for the Potions,
that wouldn't be too bad, IMHO. And I think it *would* be ironic if
Hermione turned out to have a point about the Prince's gender, despite
being wrong about the handwriting! (Also, if it turns out to be for
Lily's sake that Snape protected Harry in front of Slughorn, did he
feel that Harry had a right to the book, I wonder?)

d) Julie ... thinks Lily might have made a fine Potions Master if
she'd wanted it (and had lived), but that doesn't take away in the
least from Snape's clear mastery of the subject.

Cassy: No, but it might add a poignant touch if Lily had helped Snape
to gain that mastery in the first place.  (Incidentally, I wonder if
we're meant to think that Charms & Potions are related branches of Magic?)

JMHO,
Cassy V., who doesn't think Lily invented Sectumsempra but who thinks
that Snape might have been grudgingly impressed by Lily's trick with a
bezoar.
(http://book7.co.uk/: evidence-based synopsis)