Snape, a Deatheater.

[puduhepa98 at aol.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 163936

> Nikkalmati
> Agreed, that Snape is making a deliberate move  here, but I don't 
think the 
> motive is hidden from us by JKR. I  think she intends for us to be 
able to 
> figure it out. She is not  holding back here. 

>Magpie:
>I don't think she's holding back  either. I think she means the 
reason for Snape's taking the Vow to be a big  question mark. We 
can't know it without knowing his true allegiance. So  she's 
intentionally hiding it from us.
 
Nikkalmati
Yes, but she does want to play fair and make it possible for us to figure  it 
out or at least to understand once it is revealed.  She doesn't want the  
reader to say to her/himself after DH "well, if I had only known that . . .  "
Nikkalmati

Nikkalmati:
> This is my story and I'm sticking to  it. (For now at least). I 
don't think 
> it is a comedy, if Snape  doesn't know what he has promised with 
the UV. It 
> is even more of a  tragedy. When he promises to do the deed if 
Draco cannot, 
> he steps  off a cliff with no bottom visible. I find that plenty 
distressing 
>  for Snape, especially as he didn't see it coming. Yes, that is 
exactly what  
> Snape ends up doing - chasing Draco around. How many times did 
he  request 
> the little snake to come to his office and Draco defied him?  
Doesn't Snape 
> look pretty ineffective in his interview with Draco  during 
Slughorn's party? 
> There is some real tragic irony  here.

>Magpie:
<snip>. There's tragic irony to the scene  
>regardless of whether Snape knows the task. What makes it comical to  
me if he doesn't is that every line of Snape's in the scene is 
really  saying, "Um, what are we talking about, exactly? Could 
somebody give me a  hint?" The tragic irony is lost on Snape himself, 
because he as yet has no  idea what it is he's agreed to do. He's got 
to wait a while before that  dramatic moment comes--and when it does 
we never see it. I find it hard to  believe Rowling would write a 
tragic story all about somebody agreeing to do  something terrible 
without realizing it and then forget to write the moment  where the 
person has that terrible realization.
 
Nikkalmati
If we saw that moment, we would know his true loyalties wouldn't  we?

>Magpie
>Yes, Snape looks ineffective in trying to chase after Draco--but  
that can't be blamed on Draco being a little snake and does not 
require  Snape to have taken the Vow to find out the truth. In fact, 
once again imo,  we're given a scene where Snape's trying to find out 
what the task is where  he's given lines that don't match up to that 
in a way that Rowling really  doesn't usually do. Snape's lines to 
Draco in the Xmas party scene, imo,  make far more sense if he's 
trying to find out what Draco is specifically  doing to fulfill his 
task than if he's trying to figure out what the task  is.
 
 
Nikkallmati
 
Yes, I agree, because by the Christmas party, Katie has been injured and DD  
and Snape have figured out the target is DD.  They may have figured it out  
the first time they put their heads together in the summer, but of course, we  
can't see that or we would know SS is loyal to DD.
 
Nikkalmati 

Nikki: 
> Yes, "he means me to do it in the  end, I think" is a bluff and a 
lie. We 
> know that isn't true,  because LV intends for Draco to fail and 
the instructions 
> the DEs  on the Tower have is to stand back and let Draco do it. 
Snape 
>  doesn't even pay lip service to those instructions. He runs in, 
blows DD  away and 
> drags Draco out by the scruff of his neck. Those were not LV's  
orders. If 
> LV talked to Snape before Spinners End, his orders would  have 
been to stand 
> back and let Draco hang himself. If he had  planned for Snape to 
kill DD, he 
> could have ordered Snape to do it  at any time. No, LV doesn't 
think DD can be 
> taken out that easily  by Draco or by Snape and as long as DD is 
at Hogwarts 
> he wants  Snape there too. LV is not going to order Snape to 
reveal himself 
>  by making a potentially useless murder attempt. Draco doesn't 
matter. He,  
> unlike Snape, is expendable.

>Magpie:
>You're answering  a lot of questions here, but none of them seem to 
back up the idea that  Snape took the Vow to find out the task.

Snape's line here does not have  to be a complete lie just because of 
LV's orders as shown on the Tower.  Snape's full line is to say 
that "He" means Snape to do "it" in "the end,"  but that he means for 
Draco to "try first." In the unlikely event Draco  succeeds, Snape 
can stay at Hogwarts a while longer, Snape says. It would be  totally 
in character for LV to like the idea of Dumbledore being killed by  
Snape to drive home the betrayal and Dumbledore's mistake at 
trusting  Snape. Only Snape and Voldemort are privvy to Voldemort's 
feelings about  Snape as a double agent. Snape could very well 
understand correctly that  killing Dumbledore is something he wants 
Snape to do *in the end*. 
 
Nikkalmati
If LV thought SS could kill DD, he would have him do it immediately.   In 
fact, SS's excuse for not killing Harry is that DD stands in the way.   DD is 
LV's greatest stumbling block.  With DD out of the way, there is  little need for 
a spy at Hogwarts.  If SS stood in the Great Hall and AK'd  DD, or even 
leaned over and poisoned his mead, Hogwarts would probably be  closed. Snape here 
is making up a reason to Narcissa's why he can't do the  task for Draco.   

>Magpie
> That, in any event, is what he is saying to Bellatrix and  Narcissa, 
who do know what the task is. He's telling them that Voldemort  
intends for Snape to eventually be the person who kills Dumbledore, 
but  that he is still demanding that Draco try to kill him first. He 
understands  that his killing Dumbledore will spell the end of his 
time at Hogwarts. If  he's truly working blindfolded here, he's 
pinned the tail right on the  donkey. It's a good thing Draco's task 
really did fit all that. That's part  of the oddness of Snape in the 
scene if he's gathering information-scene if he's gathering informa
instead of letting anyone else fill things  in.
 
Nikkalmati
Whatever Draco's task is, if Snape does it first, he can anticipate it will  
reveal his loyal to LV and require him to leave Hogwarts.  If DD is dead,  he 
isn't really needed at Hogwarts anyway.  Snape is not gathering  information 
here, how can he when he has told the witches he knows  everything?  He has 
reassured Bella, first, that he is trusted by the Dark  Lord enough to know the 
plan.  He is now trying to comfort Narcissa and  assure her he will "help" 
Draco.    He intends to place himself  in a position to get the information from 
Draco later.

>  Nikkalmati:
> It is not in character IMHO for Snape to take foolish risks.  He 
is putting 
> his life on the line and I think there has to be a  corresponding 
payoff. He 
> doesn't risk himself unnecessarily. He  knows he has a valuable 
part to play 
> to bring down LV and he is not  going to waste himself. It is 
in Snape's 
> character to risk himself  to find out vital information about 
what Draco plans 
> to do and to  position himself to stop it.

>Magpie:
<snip> 
>If  Snape's goal is to find out what Draco's task is, his behavior 
should show  that in Spinner's End. Yet his behavior in Spinner's End 
doesn't show  getting information as a priority. At one point he even 
literally stops  someone from giving him the information he so 
desperately wants! If he's  bluffing he's completely forgotten to do 
so in a way that draws out  information from the other people. The 
only place in the scene where he's  allegedly actively doing 
something to find out the secret is where he takes  the Vow...an 
action that isn't related to getting a secret at all. Why would  
agreeing to do some undisclosed thing on pain of death reveal to you  
what the undisclosed thing is? It doesn't. It's only after he takes 
the  Vow that Snape has to start frantically trying to get Draco to 
tell him what  he's been told to do--he apparently didn't manage to 
get it out of Narcissa  and Bellatrix even after he took the Vow. 
The Vow as an attempt to find out  information is never referenced 
again. 
 
Nikkalmati
 
See above.  He is not trying to get information at Spinners End, it  would 
look really suspicious if he were to try to pump the sisters at this  point.  He 
stops Narcissa from telling at the very beginning to keep her  from being 
reported to LV by Bella.  Then, he realizes this is a big  opportunity (turns to 
look out the window, turns back with his plan in  place).  If he already knows 
and he can convince Bella he knows, Bella will  not report Narcissa and he 
can get the information out of Draco later without  endangering Narcissa. (I 
don't think Bella is in the position to go to LV and  say "I can't believe you 
told Snape".  That would be a serious breach of  Evil Overlord etiquette).  
Nikkalmati  

>Magpie
>And why doesn't Dumbledore just tell Snape what the task is, btw,  
since he seems to know perfectly well for most of the year? Why is 
he  making Snape chase after Draco to get him to tell him when he's 
got no  trouble figuring it out himself that I can see? In fact, why 
hasn't Snape  figured it out by the time of the Xmas party when he's 
seen the first murder  attempt? By that point a big portion of the 
audience has figured it out (if  they hadn't already in Spinner's 
End), and it's not often we're ahead of  Snape.
 
Nikkalmati
See above.  They bot figured it out pretty  quickly.

>Magpie
>Then there's the question of why Snape kills Dumbledore, which it  
leaves open (Snape didn't stop Draco). If he only took the Vow to 
find  out the task, why does he go through with it himself? To save 
his own life  at the expense of Dumbledore's? That's fine, but it 
makes Snape's  motivations all about Snape himself rather than 
anything he's trying to do  for anyone else, and so far we haven't 
seen anything about the dramatic  fallout of that between Snape and 
Dumbledore. It makes Dumbledore's death  essentially a sacrifice to 
protect Snape all due to this mistake of Snape's  that isn't really 
referenced.
 
Nikkalmati
 
I don't see how my theory changes anything about why Snape killed DD.   If 
anything, taking the UV without knowing he was promising to kill DD makes it  
less about Snape.  Knowing the UV was to kill DD, requires a lot of  explaining 
<g>.
Nikkalmati 

>Magpie
>If Snape knows what Draco's supposed to do I think it makes far more  
sense at every level. Snape is chasing Draco not to find out what 
his  task is, but to find out how Draco is trying to carry it out so 
that he can  run interference. He took the Vow for some reason that 
had to do with  killing Dumbledore or agreeing to kill Dumbledore 
upon the pain of  death--not for a reason that doesn't really follow 
from what he's doing and  is never linked to his actions in the book. 
That seems far more in keeping  with the book's climax where the two 
boys (Draco and Harry) learn that Draco  has been being watched as he 
tried to become a murderer. The only person for  whom Draco's task 
seems an important surprise seems to me to be Harry. (The  surprise 
for Snape and Dumbledore seems to me to be Draco's method of  killing 
Dumbledore--Dumbledore--<WBR>the Cabinets.) Plus, if we were really su
figured out that Snape took the Vow in order to find out "vital  
information about what Draco plans to do so that he can position 
himself  to stop it", wouldn't we all know he was really DDM? 


Nikkalmati
Yes, DD and Snape figure out the task early on and Snape is trying to find  
out the details from Draco or by following him.  (BTW I still wonder why  Draco 
thought a necklace was a suitable gift for DD.)  Clearly, JKR doesn't  want 
every one of her readers to understand that Snape is DDM.  She appears  in 
interviews to be disappointed that anyone believes in Snape.  Her story  depends 
on ambiguity in the character, but she also has to play fair and leave  us 
clues.
 
Nikkalmati (who really believed DD was not truly, completely dead  until JKR 
told us this summer and so must admit she can be wrong -  sometimes).    


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]