Clues to Snape's Loyalties

[Ceridwen]

No: HPFGUIDX 170900

vmonte: 
> He could not refuse the vow because Bella was ready to kill him if 
he did not.

Ceridwen:
Roll out your canon, please.

vmonte:
Here is the problem I have with the idea that Snape is not a person 
that's full of malice. If JKR had described Snape as being a big 
teddy bear I would assume that JKR meant that he was cute and snuggly.

When a writer (correct me if I'm wrong) writes that a person is 
spider-like and bat-like, the images I should get are of someone that 
has similar characteristics.

Why would JKR use descriptors that aren't meant to describe?

Ceridwen:
Scrimgeour looks like a lion.  The Muggle Minister thought that might 
be the reason the WW chose him to replace Fudge.  The connotations of 
a lion are nobility, strength and bravery.  But Scrimgeour acts like 
any other politician, just with a harder edge.

The descriptors JKR uses do describe, physcially.  Snape has the 
physical characteristics of a bat and a spider.  That doesn't mean he 
embodies the negative stereotypes of the bat and the spider.  It 
simply gives a mental image to people reading so they can 
better "see" Snape in their minds.  Just like Scrimgeour and his 
comforting lion's appearance, or just like Umbridge's toad-like 
looks.  Toads supposedly give warts, and if you kiss them, they turn 
into princes.

Or, is JKR suggesting that someone ought to kiss Umbridge?

What you seem to be suggesting, in my opinion, is that the Harry 
Potter books are allegories, like Pilgrim's Progress.  Names have 
meanings, and so do looks.  The bad guys always look like bad guys, 
the good guys always look like good guys.  Someone named "Weasley", 
in such a book, would "weasel" out of things, and leave their best 
friends in the lurch.  Harry would just be a geeky kid with his 
finger up his nose.  Dumbledore would be a retired boxer because of 
his crooked nose.  McGonagall, the physical embodiment of frustrated 
spinsterhood, would be the meanest teacher at the school.  Scrimgeour 
would be the hero, due to his kingly appearance.  And so on.

JKR describes the person's physical form.  She doesn't necessarily 
describe their souls.

On bats and spiders as creatures in their own right, bats eat 
mosquitos.  Mosquitos carry diseases like malaria and West Nile.  
Between bat and mosquito, I choose bat.

More on bats: people line up to watch the bats fly out of Carlsbad 
Caverns every evening.  Snape is certainly one of the more 
fascinating characters in the books - people seem to talk about him a 
lot, the way they line up to see the bats at sundown.  Then, there's 
The Batman (DC Comics), who uses the bat form as a creature of the 
night meant to strike fear into the hearts of superstitious 
criminals.  With his interest in the number seven and his belief in a 
prophecy, Voldemort could very well fall into the "superstitious 
criminal" category.

Spiders eat insects like flies and aphids, insects we don't want in 
our homes or on our plants.  Spiders are models of industry, weaving 
their webs over and over again even after they're destroyed.  I'm 
speaking as someone who is allergic to spider venom.  I would 
certainly have more reason to think of them as "dark" than people 
without that allergy, but I don't.

Ceridwen.