Harry's detention in HBP

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 168324

Betsy Hp wrote:

> This is the first potions lesson in PS/SS.  And I think everything 
that occurred there was Snape's normal teaching method.  I'd bet 
every first year got to hear that speech and I'll bet every first year
class had near impossible questions thrown at them.  It's Snape's "pay
attention, this will not be an easy course and I will be *extremely*
demanding" moment.
> 
> That he singled out Harry (because I'm fairly sure he spread his 
questions around normally) has nothing to do with Snape enjoying 
watching Harry suffer, IMO.  Snape is going on the offensive trying 
to head Harry's ego (and the class's hero-worship) off at the pass. 
Does Snape misread Harry?  Yes.  Harry wasn't buying all the sighing 
and giggling and fainting his classmates (and teachers) were doing 
around him; it made him uncomfortable if anything.  But Snape did not
know that. <snip>

Carol responds:
I agree completely. Note that Hermione is excited by the class and
*wants* to answer the questions. His snubbing of her does nothing to
dull her desire to learn as much as she can and do as well as she can
in Potions. Also, the fact that a Muggleborn who probably received her
books at the same time Harry did knows the answers to these questions
shows that the information about them is in the books assigned.
(Bezoars, of course, would not be discussed in "1,000 Magical Herbs
and Fungi," as Harry wrongly assumes, but they're probably mentioned
in "Magical Drafts and Potions.")

At any rate, a teacher as organized as Snape, who has been teaching
(as of SS/PS) for ten years, probably has certain well-rehearsed
routines that he uses with every class (though perhaps, as Betsy
suggests, he usually asks more than one student his three pre-test
questions). McGonagall always transforms into a cat in front of her
third-years. Trelawney, it seems, predicts the death of a student
every year. All of the teachers give little speeches about the
importance of OWLs (or dismissing them as mundane, in Trelawney's
case). At any rate, Snape knows the value of drama, and these
questions do establish exactly what Betsy suggests, that students are
expected to read the books, know the material, and pay attention.

That Snape chose to focus on Harry does reveal him as just an ordinary
kid to his classmates, but that's not a bad thing. It certainly strips
Draco, et al., of any delusions that he might be a Dark Lord in the
making for the DEs to rally around in the absence of Voldemort. It
also allows Harry to cultivate real friends instead of having to deal
with a fan club following him around at all times. (True, he has Colin
Creevey in CoS, but Colin is not in his year. And we see with Viktor
Krum and others how inconvenient and annoying a perpetual fan club can
be. Harry doesn't *want* to be a celebrity, so, deliberately or not,
Snape does him a favor by stripping away the aura of celebrity from
Day One.)

I wonder, by the way, how different the reaction of the students, and
of Snape, would have been if Harry had thoroughly read and absorbed
the material. I also wonder whether Draco knew the answers to the
questions. I'll bet he at least knew what a Bezoar was.

At any rate, if Harry had not had preconceptions about Snape and
Slytherin, he might simply have regarded Snape as a strict teacher
like McGonagall. Instead, he forms the idea that Snape is picking on
Gryffindor, especially after Neville somehow melts Seamus's cauldron
and Snape, in frustration at seeing the students covered with boils,
calls him an idiot boy. Had, say, Justin Finch-Fletchley (a
Muggleborn) been in Harry's place, he would probably have reacted
differently. Then, again, since his name was down for Eton, he might
have known the answers. Ernie Macmillan (a pureblood Hufflepuff) would
also have known them.

Sigh. The plot demands an increasing antagonism and misunderstanding
between Harry and Snape, which begins here, if not with Snape's
supposedly making Harry's scar hurt. I can only hope it's resolved at
last in DH.

Carol, who would probably have responded much as Hermione did had
Snape been her teacher