Snape's turn to DEs (Re: The Prince interpreted)

[cubfanbudwoman]

No: HPFGUIDX 173222

Carol:
> > His despair caused him to join his "friends" because he felt he 
> > had not other choice. Lily is prejudging him, assuming that 
> > because *they* have become Death Eaters, he has done so, too, but 
> > I think she's mistaken. Not only does he still love her (not a 
> > silly crush like Harry's on Cho at the same age: she's all he 
> > cares about other than DADA and maybe Potions, apparently),  but 
> > she's the one who says, "You've chosen your way. I've chosen 
> > mine." (DH Am. ed. 676). There's no evidence that he's done 
> > anything worse than turning a blind eye to his friends' Death 
> > Eater ambitions. Clearly, he's not like them, nor is there any 
> > evidence that he routinely uses the word "Mudblood" or she would 
> > not have been shocked by it. 


Jen:
> But my main objection to the above interpretation is the idea that 
> Lily holds even an iota of responsibility for Snape's choice to 
> join the DEs.  Even if her decision to turn her back on him was 
> premature and made without the whole story (and as I said above, 
> there's evidence this was not the case), Snape and Snape alone made 
> the decision to follow Voldemort.  
> 
> In fact, my understanding was Lily was the only thing tethering 
> Snape to a different path, and her awareness of that fact was one 
> reason she made a point of talking to him about his friends and 
> defending him to others.  


SSSusan:
I *totally* agree with what Jen is saying here.  

I really have no idea, Carol, where you have gotten some of the 
things you are alleging here, sorry.  How is it you know that Snape 
hadn't yet turned towards his friends & their DE activities?  How is 
it you know he only did so because Lily essentially abandoned him 
(which your remarks seem to imply)?  How is it you know that all he's 
done is turn a blind eye to some of the things they've done?  (He 
certainly didn't seem upset at ALL by Mulciber's use of Dark Magic 
just for grins, now did he?)

IMO, these scenes from Snape's memories were included by JKR to 
provide **just that evidence** that Snape HAD been drifting towards 
his 'little Death Eater friends.'  I cannot fathom where it has been 
shown that he was doing no such thing, nor that he hadn't yet done 
anything beyond turning a blind eye!  

Rather, it appears to me that what Jen has stated is the case -- Lily 
appears to be all that's tethering Snape to a different path.  It 
appears to me that Snape simply didn't have the courage (or 
interest?) to choose that different path!  Even with how much 
he 'loved' her.

Lily, in fact, says they *have chosen* their different paths, past 
tense, not that she suspects he's about to choose his different one.  
It seems to me that she stuck around longer than she would have 
ordinarily ['I've defended you for years'], out of loyalty to him 
from their long friendship... just as it struck me that he didn't 
mean to call *her* (only her) 'Mudblood' out of 'respect' for their 
long friendship.  

She stuck with him 'for years.'  If she was only just beginning to 
suspect and to worry, she would have asked him what was going on.  
But when she speaks with him, she speaks about things that *have 
happened,* about things she doesn't like seeing in him.  And when she 
says, "You can't wait to join You-Know-You, can you?" [paraphrased], 
he doesn't deny it!

No, the memories show that the point had arrived when it was no 
longer any good pretending that at the CORE there wasn't something 
very, very wrong with what Severus was doing, in Lily's view.  It 
wasn't a suspicion of things to come; it was a being fed up with what 
had already come.

One final remark.  As to Snape loving Lily, and not in a 'silly 
crush' kind of way, as had been the case with Harry concerning Cho... 
I will agree with you that Snape loved Lily, but I don't think it was 
something to glorify.  It sounds as if Harry is being insulted with 
that remark, that he only had this 'puppy love' kind of thing, 
whereas Snape had 'REAL Love' about Lily.  But it just wasn't 
healthy!  It was an *obsessive* love, not what I would term 'real 
love.'   

Siriusly Snapey Susan