[HPforGrownups] Re: My current opinion of Snape (Longish) / Re: Clues to Snape's Loyalties

[Kathryn Lambert]

No: HPFGUIDX 170830

jbenne27 at tampabay.rr.com wrote:          Charles: 
> I hate to say it, but this statement is wrong on two points. 
> 
> First, Hermione is not always right. She was, to quote just one 
> instance, dead wrong about Draco Malfoy throughout the majority of 
> HBP. Second, by the end of HBP she does not believe Snape is DDM. 
> Nobody in the WW except possibly Snape and the portrait of DD would 
> think so at this point, and I have my doubts about the portrait. 

> <<<<MAJOR SNIPPAGE>>>> 
> ****Katie responds: 
> Ok, let me rephrase. <<<SNIPPAGE>>>However, as I 
> stated in my previous post, I believe that the departure from the 
> pattern of Harmione being right/Harry being wrong, and Snape being 
> the *good* (if not always nice) guy is a purposeful misdirection 
> by JKR. HBP does not fit the pattern of the previous 5 books - 
> because JKR is deliberately making the reader think that the 
> previous 5 books have been misleading. It's a psuedo-plot twist. 

jbenne: 
I feel ya'll are missing the point on this.<<<SNIPPAGE>>>She [JKR]has worked hard at this but always leaving a tiny light that he could be good. Seeing how hard she has worked to paint him as a dark person, he will turn out to be dark but on the correct side. He will help Harry in some way but he will never like Harry and will always have a dark personality about him. But he will support the OOTP in the end. 

  ****Katie responds: Yes, jbenne, that's exactly what I was saying. Snape isn't "nice" - but he is on the right side of the fight. So, I don't think I was missing the point - I think we are agreeing with each other, but phrasing it differently.
   JKR has been misdirecting us into believing Snape was bad - only here's where I disagree with your interpretation...I never got the idea that Snape was bad until his obvious badness at the end of HBP, which did throw me off-balance when I first read it. I did question Snape briefly, until I reread and looked for clues.
   
  But in CoS - OotP, Snape is definitely cast as the dark good guy. I never felt that JKR was trying to tell us he was bad, but rather that good guys don't always seem like good guys and appearances can be deceiving. In SS/PS, he is simply the foil for Quirrell - as Quirrell says, "swooping around like an overgrown bat". But Harry's suspicions of Snape are proven to be quite wrong, and from that point on, I see Snape as the unlikely good guy. Only Sirius and Harry truly distrust him...until the Lightening Struck Tower, of course.
   
  I know I'm sort of beating the dead horse a little...but I really believe that Snape is a good guy. Not a nice guy, not a likeable guy, but someone who knows what is at stake if Voldemort wins, and someone who realizes that while he hates Harry, Harry is a smart, capable, and important wizard. Which maybe makes him hate Harry all the more. But Snape has never tried to kill Harry, which of course would definitely make him evil, because he's not a bad guy! One of the things I love about the WW is that good guys don't always seem good, bad guys certainly don't always seem bad, and good people can make bad decisions and sometimes be cruel...much like the real world. No, Snape's not my first choice for teacher of the year - but I really do believe he's on the right side of the fight.    Katie


  .

 
         

       
---------------------------------
Boardwalk for $500? In 2007? Ha! 
Play Monopoly Here and Now (it's updated for today's economy) at Yahoo! Games.

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