Slytherin's Reputation was Re: CHAPDISC: DH, EPILOGUE

[montavilla47]

No: HPFGUIDX 185643

> > Montavilla47:
> 
> > <snip> I still don't know how we're supposed to take that scene with
> Snape in the garden.  I'll give JKR credit for being deliberately
> ambiguous here.  Is Snape's "stricken" look because Dumbledore is
> being so horribly offensive?  Or is it because he realizes his
> enthusiasm for the "brainy" House was what led him astray so many
> years ago?
> 
> Carol responds:
> 
> IIRC, the remark about sorting too soon is made long before the garden
> scene, at the point in GoF where Snape tells DD that he has no
> intention of running away like Karkaroff and DD says that Snape is a
> much braver man than Karkaroff. 


Montavilla47:

Um, yes. But didn't that all happen in the garden?  That was my
impression--that he and Dumbledore were talking in the garden
during the Yule Ball.

Carol:
> But back to Snape's reaction. He's surprised and hurt. That's what
> "stircken" implies. Is he surprised that DD would implicitly insult
> his House, evidently equating it with Death Eaters? (IMO, Karkaroff,
> despite his name and his profession as Durmstrang headmaster, was a
> Hogwarts student at one time and most likely a Slytherin.) 

Montavilla47:
I don't know why you'd assume that Karkaroff went to Hogwarts
at all, let alone that he was sorted in Slytherin.  He seems to know 
everyone, sure, but that seems to be case regardless in the wizarding
world.  Everyone know everybody, except for Harry.


Carol:
>Or does he
> hate Gryffindor so much that he he's hurt by the idea of being Sorted
> there? I think it's the first. Slytherin was a home to him and he
> still has Slytherin friends, including the Malfoys. His experience
> with Gryffindors, in contrast, has not been cordial. I suppose it's
> rather like a man saying in the presence of the woman he's speaking
> of, "She should have been born a man." 

Montavilla47:
Well, the analogy I like to make is someone saying to Jesse Jackson,
"That's mighty white of you, brother."

Carol:
>In the speaker's mind, it's a
> compliment. In the listener's mind, especially if she's happy being a
> woman, it's both a compliment and an insult. But even that won't do
> because men and women aren't traditional enemies. Maybe a Syrian
> saying of an Israeli Jew, "He should have been born a Muslim" or vice
> versa? I can't think of a good analogy, but, obviously, both Snape and
> DD are thinking only of two Houses. DD has been speaking of courage.
> Obviously, he doesn't mean that Snape should have been Sorted into
> Hufflepuff or Ravenclaw.
> 
> To me, it's just another example of DD's tactlessness. He lectures
> other people on their manners (Vernon Dursley and the Carrows, for
> example), but his own could use some improvement. His sense of his own
> superiority is part of it, I think, but old age may be part of it,
> too. He says something to Harry in OoP about forgetting what it's like
> to be young. He's forgotten not only what it's like to be a teenager
> but what it's like to be in your mid-thirties (Snape is not quite 35
> at the time).

Montavilla47:
I agree that it's tactless, but I'm just not sure we're intended to read
it that way.  Dumbledore isn't talking to himself.  He's speaking to 
Snape and he's speaking very gently, which says to me that he's trying
to be very tactful.  He's pleased with Snape's courage and determination
to do the right thing (even if he hates that stupid Potter kid).  So
Dumbledore tries to come up with something complimentary to say
about Snape and the best he can come up with is that Snape isn't as
cowardly and useless as the House he was sorted into--and what a 
shame it was that poor Snape was judged too soon.

Mind you, maybe JKR's intention is to get us to hate Dumbledore
at that point.  If so, she definitely succeeded with me. But--and 
maybe this comes from years of trying to explain exactly what
I found offensive about Dumbledore's remark about Merope 
not being as courageous as Lily--I get the feeling we're supposed
to view Dumbledore's compliment as a what he intends it to be and 
not as an offensive slap.

Carol:
> As for Snape finally realizing that he'd been led astray long ago,
> that's a thought that hadn't occurred to me. I don't think that
> happens or we'd see a change in his attitude toward both the
> Slytherins and the Gryffindors.

Montavilla47:
You make a very good point here.  Unless the point of all that is
that Snape is still too horrible a person to be able to change and 
show the proper attitude toward Slytherin and Gryffindor.

> montavilla47: 
> > I mean, I don't think it would have made Snape's life much better to
> have been sorted into Slytherin. 
> 
> Carol:
> 
> Erm, Gryffindor, do you mean?
> 
Montavilla47:
Erm, yes.  Sorry about that!