Disappointment Was: Deaths in DH WAS: Re: Dumbledore (but more Snape)

[prep0strus]

No: HPFGUIDX 177559


> Julie:
> I do see your point of view. Draco's story is one of the better
> examples to me of how canon leaves open several avenues of 
> development, including the one that happened, and whether we
> each like how the story developed in DH or didn't like it, 
> neither view is conflicted by canon (i.e., neither view reflects
> that recently popularized term "wish fulfillment). I sit in
> the middle on a lot of issues and this is one of them. I too
> wanted to see Draco to recognize the evil inherent in his 
> pureblood ideology and turn unequivocally to the "good" side.
> But there was really nothing in the canon depiction of Draco
> that pointed to this result as the likely one. In fact there
> is much against it.
<SNIP>
> 
> Which all goes to say that I saw Draco's journey differently
> than you did, and I didn't see Draco as lazy or lacking in
> motivation or even as truly cowardly (despite moments of such
> that were for me mitigated by his concern for his family).
> Nor did I see his journey as pointless. And while like all of
> us I would have liked to see a Draco more like the one I 
> imagined before the release of DH, on this issue JKR did not
> in any way forshadow such a Draco. We didn't all get what we
> wanted with Draco, but she didn't cheat him, IMO.
> 

Prep0strus:
I think, for me, a lot is in in the expectations.  After the strong
presence of Draco in the 6th book, as well as (what I surmised as the
motivations) the sacrifice of Dumbledore, I expected a lot out of
Draco's story in the 7th book.  I don't know exactly what I expected
to be the outcome, but I thought it would have a very important place.
And it didn't.  And mostly, it left the image with me of Draco over
the 7 books as meanspirited, cowardly, and cruel.  The conclusion to
his story was a letdown, and as a result, I think I am more inclined
to see him in a negative light.  While I can comprehend more positive
interpretations of his actions, I don't see concrete evidence that he
is on a truly better path, or he is truly a better person, than the
mean and selfish bigoted boy we've known throughout the series.


> 
> Julie:
> It's too bad you don't care about Snape's story, because he
> did get what you wanted to see in Draco, a change of heart.
> (Yes, I hear the screams of protest now...down, I say! ;-)
> We see a character who allowed himself to be drawn in by the
> crowd around him, who ignored his one good friend and finally
> lost her so he could belong, who took on the Pureblood cause 
> willingly (though his relationship with his wife-battering 
> Muggle father at least gives us a sympathetic explanation for
> the ease with which he could reject Muggles and Muggleborns
> for Wizards and Purebloods). We also see a character who loved
> enough to reject that Pureblood ideology and the torture and
> killing that went with it, first for his love of one woman,
> but after years of association with the "Good" side who did
> in fact adopt the very ethics and ideology of those he'd 
> joined initially for the single purpose of making up his 
> unwitting betrayal of Lily by protecting her son.
>

Prep0strus:
The thing is, Snape's story ended before the series began for me.  All
he really did was die. ok, ok, i take it back. that's not entirely
true.  he showed courage he did not have to in becoming spy for the
good side and all that. but really, the moment of change occurred
before Harry was even born.  And later on you refer to the first step
characters take... but Snape only took that first step.  or, at least,
he didn't get very far down the path.  sure, he turns from evil, but
does it ever truly change HIM?  years later he is as bitter, angry,
lonely, and nasty as ever.  Any interest shown in his character seems
to be his backstory - what happened before.  But what about what
happens next? nothing happens next. snape is stagnant.  many read a
change in the last look into harry's eyes - many others don't.  but
aside from that... snape is snape.  he goes nowhere in the story.  i
always assumed he was 'good', but the fact that he was also mean just
made him annoying to me, not intriguing. 

part of it may even be unconscious - most assume snape has 'redeemed'
himself. but has he truly gotten redemption?  This is taking it to a
story level, perhaps, but redeemed characters usually achieve some
aspect of peace, some reward.  and, in feeling like snape did not get
that, perhaps somewhere i also feel he hasn't earned it.  far be in
from me to pity snape or feel for him... but could he be more tragic?
 dumbledore has stumbled, he is in many ways very slytherin like, but
at his end... he is alone, but he has friends. he has people he loves
and who love him.  snape is truly alone - 'no one mourns the wicked'.
 even knowing he was not wicked, harry can appreciate his sacrifice,
others can admire his bravery.  but do they love him? does snape love
them?

snape has loved once. and it kept him through his life. but he never
had another friend. he never got over his bitterness, never allowed
himself to be less lonely, less harsh.  and, in writing this, i feel
for him more than i ever have before. but a lot of that is his choice.
 and, of course, jkr's choice - she made a choice to have him be
redeemed, but never to earn love or happiness.  i think an argument
can be made that SHE doesn't think he's earned it.  that he still is a
representative of something that is more wrong than right.

snape is... the lack of hope.  there is no hope in severus snape, or
for severus snape.  his story doesn't touch me (despite how my writing
may appear here), his character mostly disgusts me, because there is
no hope.  his redemption occurred long ago, and didn't make much of a
dent in the awful person that he was.  he dies, and... that's the end.
 (i don't even know why i'm thinking of it, but something makes me
think of dobby's death - dying and putting an end to the whole idea of
elf freedom. a messy c plotline jkr devoted a ton of time to, and then
threw away, because with dobby's death, no other elf even cares to be
free.  dobby's death is the lack of hope for elves just as snape's
death is the lack of hope for snape.  ok, terrible comparison.  but
something about them connected in my head. maybe i'll figure it out later)

this is why i wanted draco.  snape was the past.  it happened before,
and went nowhere.  draco is the NOW. the chance for redemption perhaps
even before he performed true evil.  the chance for HOPE in a
character previously on a path of destruction.  a chance to watch
change and enlightenment and redemption unfold before us, and not just
be told it happened a long time ago - with its net effects being
pretty meager.  a redeemed draco is a hope for an even better draco in
the future, and a better future in the future.  the way it turned
out... it's just such a letdown.

> 
> Julie:
> But doesn't all change start that way, small and personal?
> No bigot suddenly jumps up and says, "Hey, I was wrong, so
> now I've done a complete about face! I love those (whoever
> he/she previously despised)." Small and personal is EXACTLY how
> Snape started out, doing it all for Lily, the woman he had
> betrayed and Voldemort had mistreated (if you can call 
> murder such). He only cared about that one thing, atoning to
> Lily. But eventually he cared about saving those he could,
> whoever they were and whether he liked or loathed them. He
> adopted new principles. But it didn't happen immediately,
> and it didn't happen without some event upsetting his own
> narrow belief system, and I don't think it ever does.
> 

Prep0strus:
You're right, except I don't think every small change becomes a large
one - as I feel about snape. and more, in the context of my previous
posting, it's that regalus is still unable to represent goodness or
nobility in slytherin, because that change still is small.  it's an
interesting story, and certainly makes him more than any random death
eater, but i know him still to be a bigot, still to have chosen evil,
and while perhaps his future might have held something different had
he lived, he still can't be held up as we know him to be a beacon of
light and goodness in the house of slytherin.


> 
> Julie:
> Here I agree with you. But again, it *is* a start. Narcissa
> comes to see the real, vicious and uncaring Voldemort, the
> promoter of Pureblood supremacy, which does at least some
> damage to the whole concept when she considers what it did
> to her family. That doesn't mean she's going to do a complete
> about face either. And in reality, JKR did fail here in my
> opinion, giving us not a hint of how relations stood between
> Purebloods and the rest of the WW in the epilogue. 
> 
> As for being reprehensible without being evil, you probably
> know my feelings about that. No eleven year old child can
> be reprehensible let alone evil, though he could be heading
> that way if those skewed values continue to be actively 
> encouraged or even simply not *discouraged* by the adults
> around him. 
> 

Prep0strus:
Well, reprehensible without being evil can apply to adults then, can't
it? because that's still how i see the adult slytherins.  it's hard
for me to argue about the children, because... well, personally i
don't even believe in free will, but also lack the ability to act as
if i don't believe in free will.  so i don't know that any adult can
be 'evil' either, but then i also don't know if any child is more or
less responsible for their own actions (if i don't believe anyone is,
how can someone be less so?).  i think some actions can be fairly
reprehensible, even in children. and by the end of the series, these
'children' are young adults.  but the path draco was on, is on, can
certainly be attributed to his parents, who i don't see changing their
core values.


> 
> Julie:
> Ouch! (See above). Really, we can see Slytherin House as an
> allegory for evil, as I think you once suggested. But then it
> is rather pointless to debate the relative worth of the 
> individual characters at all. And since we are doing that, 
> and treating them as real people (you don't want to spend
> 30 seconds with any of them--at least the ones we've met),
> then we can't just dismiss by saying the world is better off
> without them. Unless we want to support a WW version of
> Minority Report, where instead of sorting the undesirable
> quarter of students into Slytherin House they are sorted 
> right into the Juvenile version of Azkaban, or perhaps to
> the feed factory where they are rendered harmless by being
> turned into green squares of food for the hippogriffs and
> thestrals...
> 
> Still, I agree that there shouldn't be a Slytherin House.
> Children who have already been indoctrinated with bigotry
> and the worst values should be sorted with those who have
> the best values, not with more of the worst! At least then
> they'd have an honest chance to experience a different 
> way, and to absorb better values. 
> 
> Julie, who would have been happy to see the Sorting Hat
> destroyed, and Hogwarts nineteen years later filled with
> unsorted students, and teachers who cared about the welfare
> of EVERY child, not just the ones in their own "house."
>

Prep0strus:
Man, it goes so hard to break down the difference between the
characters as people and the characters as literary devices when
talking about this.  I mean, they are characters who were given enough
depth that they can be discussed, that i can know i would dislike them
as people.  on the other hand, part of the point of my earlier posting
was that i think perhaps jkr, despite making them into decently
rounded characters, never truly though of them as equals as people,
but as representatives of something undesirable.  and so, how do i
answer that?  i think, in her world, it is not slytherin house that
MAKES them what they are, but simply a place where undesirable people
end up.  i think, based on the world we are given, it probably does
make sense to simply eliminate anyone who would be a slytherin. i
think the world would be better off without any individual slytherin
you could name, and the world would be MUCH better off without the
whole lot of them. 

but, of course, taking the idea to the real world doesn't work,
because the real world doesn't work that way. probably their evil
tendencies ARE reinforced in the house. likely there are many ways we
could improve the way the ww works and the values instilled in the
children. but my original point was that it is not any more wrong to
look down on a slytherin than it is to look down on the idea of
racism.  and taking that further, it is no more wrong to eliminate the
world of slytherins than to eliminate the world of racism. 
symbolically, i think jkr got mixed up, because she did inspire some
sympathy and complexity in some slytherins.  but by never giving a
likable or admirable slytherin, by making almost every evil deed
performed performed by a slytherin, by making the values described by
slytherin to be distasteful values, and by not allowing true
redemption or happiness or acceptance to come to any slytherin, she
has created a far more powerful symbol of them being deservedly
unworthy.  i don't know if the mistake was not making them more equal
or by not making them more one-sidedly evil, but something went amiss
for me, and my eventual conclusion is that they represent what is
wrong in humanity, not the opportunity for change.