Snape's Psychology: WAS: More thoughts on the Elder Wand subplot - Owner?

[nikkalmati]

No: HPFGUIDX 187971



--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, Bart Lidofsky <bart at ...> wrote:
>
> Nikkalmati:
> > I think that Snape's belief in LV was completely destroyed in the instant he found out that LV intended to kill the Potters, and he had no recourse other than to throw himself on the mercy of DD.  Snape thought he was risking his life by talking to DD, who might kill him on sight, so he must have given up all hope that LV would spare her. 
> 
> Bart:
>     There is a story about a religious teacher, who was giving a lecture 
> series. He was with a companion, looking out his window. Several 
> teenagers started to strip a  car on the street.
> 
>     The teacher looked down. He commented to his companion, "I know what 
> they are doing is wrong, but look at the skill with which they are 
> performing their task. There is a sort of poetry to it .... Hey! Wait a 
> second! That's MY car!!!!!!"
> 
>     I suspect that Snape was kind of like that teacher, depersonalizing 
> the evil that the Death Eaters were doing because they gave him 
> recognition, until it became personal, and it was only then that he 
> realized that not only were they going after his lifelong friend, but it 
> went further; that EVERYTHING he had been doing was wrong. Snape turning 
> sides for selfish reasons was disgusting, but Snape repenting was not.
> 
>     Bart

Nikkalmati

Certainly, if Snape began to spy for DD from the moment on the hilltop (and it is implied that spying was the price DD asked), Snape was risking his life from that time on, and he must have given up on LV sparing Lily's life.    We know that LV tried to honor his promise, so maybe Snape knew Lily would not accept. I agree that Snape turned from LV completely from the moment he learned Lily was on the hit list.    

  Harry was a year old when Lily and James were killed, so did LV wait almost a year before deciding Harry was the Prophecy Boy?  It would seem so, because the Potters went into hiding only a few weeks before LV killed them and the response to the information and the request on the hilltop would make sense if they went into hiding immediately after that.  
>
Nikkalmati