Did you LIKE Snape?

[horridporrid03]

No: HPFGUIDX 183156

> >> Mike:
> > We've had a recent thread that mourns the passing of Snape. I 
> > don't, but that led to this query.
> > <snip>

Betsy Hp:
Just when I thought I was out, you pull me back in. :D  It's a good 
question with a complicated answer, for me.  Pre-DH, the answer was 
easy: I quite liked Snape.  Like, a lot.  And yeah, I'd have totally 
been friends with him, from childhood onward.  Sure there would have 
been times that I'd cry, "Oh, Severus, you *didn't*!" and other times 
we'd get into massive philosophical battles (OMG, fun!!).  But I saw 
him as a solid, intelligent, principled guy with a delicious wit and 
a healthy sense of irony.  Totally BFF material. ;) 

Post-DH?  Yeah... no, we wouldn't have been friends.  I think I'd 
have *tried* to be his friend, but his continuing sense of 
worthlessness, his bizarre fixation on those who those who thought so 
little of him (Lily and then Dumbledore), would have turned me off.  

I'd have felt pity, but with a tinge of contempt (which is ugly of 
me, I recognize, but there it is).  I think I'd have joined with 
others in mourning what could have been.  If I'd gone to 
Hogwarts ::shudder::, I think I would have felt a certain solidarity 
with him (as a fellow Slytherin <eg>), and so I'd have been friendly. 
But it's hard to be friends with someone who isn't friends back.  And 
post-DH!Snape wasn't equipped, unfortunately.

> >>Magpie:
> <snip>
> But unfortunately he has to compete with the guy I thought he was   
> for the first six books and he can't.

Betsy Hp:
Exactly.  The Snape I knew, pre-DH, would have looked at the DH-Snape 
with shuddering horror.  That Snape died wasn't what hurt me; JKR 
made sure he never really lived.  And that's what I mourn.

Betsy Hp