Did you LIKE Snape?

[Mike]

No: HPFGUIDX 183432

> > In post 183133 "Mike" wrote:
> > 
> > I wanted to know if you liked Severus Snape. 
> > I don't want to know if you liked having his character in the
> > books, I've already said that I liked having Snape in the books
> > and I hate the guy. I'm not really asking if you sympathize or
> > empathize with him. Heck, I sympathize with the young Severus 
> > in the playground with Lily, pre-Hogwarts. No, what I want 
> > to know is if you *liked* Severus? 
> 
> Potioncat:
> <snip> 
> It isn't an easy question to answer.
> 
> Severus Snape is still something of an enigma, so that those who 
> would count him as friend don't agree on who the man was, and
> those who see him as foe, see him all together differently-- and
> as varied-- than the first group. So, if I answer, yes, I liked
> him, it wouldn't be same Snape that some of you see.

Mike now:
I thought I would answer my own question. No wait,... I already 
answered it didn't I? Well then I'll expound on my answer. A good 
place to start is in response to what PC just wrote above.

I not only think friend and foe see him differently, I think we met 
three different Severus Snapes. He starts out as TAB -- "That Awful 
Boy" -- Snape, a suprisingly (to me) likable young wizard, from a 
tough home life. I felt sorry for TAB and wanted to root for him to 
get to Hogwarts and change his life around. But even TAB shows signs 
of his disdain for those lesser than him. He denegrates Petunia 
with "you're a Muggle" upon first meeting her and right in front of 
Lily. Not much tact on young TAB's part, was it? ;-) 

[Side note: Did TAB Snape go to Muggle primary school? I ask because 
Petunia knew who he was and where he lived. I can't see that being 
the case unless they went to the same school. I sure don't think much 
of his witch mother and I could easily see his domineering Muggle 
father demanding their household function as fully Muggle, including 
sending Sev to the local Muggle school.]

But all-in-all, I'd say that TAB Snape was more likeable than not. 
That goes for right up through the train ride to Hogwarts, where I 
think he acquitted himself much better than did James or Sirius.

Then we met Snivellus Snape. Now we heard stories about Snivellus in 
PoA and GoF, and got a snapshot of him in SWM in OotP. If, as Alla 
hypothesized, we had met James, Sirius, and Snivellus in SWM before 
any of the other back story, I might not have had the same opinion of 
any of the three. But that's not the way the story unfolded, and I 
felt vindicated in my opinion when I saw Snivellus in "The Prince's 
Tale". Sneaking around, trying to get something on the Marauders, 
hoping to get them expelled, all the while breaking the rules himself 
in his attempt to collect this information. 

Hanging around with future Death Eaters, in fact, fancying himself as 
the same. If he had been a dullert or a bully I could forgive him for 
being seduced to the dark side. I think that's what happened to 
Regulus. But Snivellus surely didn't have parents that were backing 
Voldemort, and everything points to Snivellus being much brighter 
than a Mulciber or an Avery. I think I've a right to have expected 
better from him. This is where Snape becomes irretrievable for me. 
Once we were shown that he was a true believer at the time of his 
eavesdropping the prophesy, he crossed a line that I can't abide.

The third Snape, the one we got through most of the books, is the one 
I've dubbed QED Snape. That's Quintuple-Ess (Spying, Snarky, Snide, 
Sarcastic, Sadistic) Demented Snape. Demented because he lost his 
soul when Lily died. Though he was a fully realized adult, he 
basically quit life and lived for his revenge on Voldemort as DD's 
puppet. That's something we only fully understood after DH. 

That QED Snape was stuck in the past was only too evident in the 
Shrieking Shack in PoA and at the kitchen table of 12 GP in OotP. 
Sirius has an excuse for his lack of maturity - 12 years in Azkaban. 
But what's Snape's excuse? None, other than that boyhood grudge that 
Lupin acused him of in the Shack. QED (quod erat demonstrandum), 
yeah, I planned the double entendre, Snape never got over his teen 
through true-DE years, his Snivellus years. And he became Snivellus 
of his own accord, he's got nobody to blame other than himself. Then, 
for me, he continued to demonstrate those teenage qualities when he 
long since should have become an adult about things.



> Potioncat: 
> So, yes, I liked Snape. Now, that didn't surprise anyone, did it? 
> Being fully in the fictional Potterverse, and meeting Snape in the
> way we all did, I liked him; not at first. Not till I realized he
> was up to something. I started to see that in most cases, when he
> was being snarky, he was also doing something else. 
>     At that point, I started enjoying his sarcastic humor, even
> as I winced at his treatment of the students. 

Mike:
Can I admit I laughed at his snarky humor all the while forming a 
distinct distaste for the character? I too was good with the snark as 
a teen. But I learned that it doesn't go over well when you become an 
adult. So I can laugh at the character Snape's snarky quips knowing 
that if I had met him face to face I would have a distinct distaste 
for his type of truncated-maturation personality.


> Potioncat:
> I think it would depend on when I met him. 
> <snip>
> 
> If I had met him as an 11-year-old, I would have become his
> friend, or had I met him after LV's fall--and found later he had
> been a DE, I would be his friend.

Mike:
Like I said, I might have liked him okay if I had met him when we 
were both 9-year-olds. But I would have soon grown tired of him and 
instead competed with him in the academic arena and no-doubt 
outshined him in the athletic arena.

But if I had met him after, and found out he *used* to be a DE,... NO 
WAY! From afar I would have said a silent congratulations for turning 
his life around, if I had known he had done that. But I have no use 
for people that have EVER been a part of a terrorist organization, 
repentance or not.



> Potioncat:
> I'm not sure what would have happened, if we had been friends and
> then I found out he had joined the DEs. And, I'm not sure if a
> friendship would have survived his use of Mudblood, but I don't
> think he arrived at Hogwarts using that word.
> 
> If we had been friends as youngsters I would die laughing at his 
> barbs, and sometimes rebuke him. 
 
> There was something intriguing in someone who could behave 
> so badly while doing the right thing.

Mike:
I agree that he learned Mudblood while in Slytherin.

I too would have enjoyed his youthful snark and probably joined him.

Intriguing, umm yeah, but not as in 'I'd like to be your friend' kind 
of intrigue. More like a 'That Snape, what an ass. Where does he get 
off?' kind of intrigue. Lots of head shaking whenever I was around 
him.


> Potioncat:
> <snip>  The scene that concerned me--as a Snape friend--happened
> later. Snape's conversation with Fudge bothered me a great deal.
> However, it makes more sense now. 

Mike:
All part of my reason to despise the Snape at the end of PoA, from 
the Shack onward to the end. When he bound and gagged Lupin, refusing 
to listen to the other side, that was it for me. Harry showed more 
maturity in that situation than Snape did.

Some people have pointed out that Snape conjured a stretcher for 
Sirius too. That he was saving him from the Dementors. That's not 
what all his ensuing conversations showed. The Dementors were gone 
when he conjured those stretchers, of course he wasn't going to leave 
Sirius out there where he might come to and make his escape. He 
brought him up to the castle with the others, saw him locked up with 
the intent of bringing a Dementor up to him to have his soul sucked. 
He even asked Fudge if it was going to happen right away. So why 
shouldn't I believe that was his intent in the Shack, to have Sirius 
soul sucked?

I repeat, I DON'T CARE if he thought Sirius was guilty and that Remus 
was helping him. He was aiding and abetting a miscarriage of justice 
that would result in a man becoming "worse than dead" based mostly on 
a boyhood grudge. That's the way I read it.


> Potioncat:
> <snip>
> 
> Several have posted that they would have wanted Severus as a 
> friend, but he might not choose them. I don't think so. Young 
> Severus was desperate for friends. I think he would have responded 
> to gestures of friendship, particularly where the interests were 
> similar.

Mike:
He's all yours, PC. :D


> Potioncat:
> <snip>
> So there is something positive to Snape, not seen on the page.

Mike:
Yep, as I'm convinced there is a lot of negative in his teen Hogwarts 
years not on the page. Though I agree with Catlady, it's possible to 
like both Severus and Sirius at the same time, I don't like Snape.

Mike, who wrote most of this post shortly after PC posted hers then 
forgot about it and let that darn RW get in the way ;-)