Snape and Harry

[nikkalmati]

No: HPFGUIDX 188912



--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "dkolker1969" <dkolker1969 at ...> wrote:
>
> My biggest disappointment with the entire series was that there was not a scene in the 5th book when Harry apologized to Snape for how his father had treated him.  I was waiting for it after Harry witnessed the Levicorpus moment and James' humiliation of Snape.  Maybe because I read the books alongside my then-8-year-old son, I was very sensitive to the dynamics among the schoolboys.  I felt as though JKR made it very clear that even though Harry physically resembled James, personality wise he was much more like Lily.  I was glad at the end of DH that Harry had recognized Snape's bravery and decency, but I would have liked to have seen a moment between the two of them when Snape was alive, even though I'm sure Harry would have been bumbling and unable to articulate what he was trying to say, and Snape would have been sneering and dismissive, but deep down they would have shared a level of understanding.
> 
> -- Danielle, die-hard Snape fan

Nikkalmati

I think it would have made sense at that point in the story for Harry to have done something to apologise for his behavior and to indicate he was ashamed of his father's.  This is one of the unresolved conflicts that JKR left hanging.  (I mentioned earlier that we are not privileged to see how Snape resolved the conflict between his promise to protect Harry and the reason DD asked him to make that promise.)  Here we dont see how Harry resolves the shock of seeing his father behave as a bully with his previous view of his father as a popular and talented hero.  He even questions how his mother could have married James and speculates that maybe James gave her a potion.

Harry talks to Lupin but he only finds out that James never stopped hexing Snape and merely concealed it from Lily.  Harry's shock is sincere, but the story marches on and the issue is shoved under the rug.  I beleive you are feeling the lack of some proper resolution between Harry and Snape.

Another unresolved issue is how Harry ever absorbed the fact that Snape was a confident of DD, loved his mother, and had been her close friend for many years.  Of course, it happened at the same time he was given the information that he was a Horcrux and had to die willingly without fighting in order to purge the world of LV.  No wonder he was not given the chance to absorbe the information about Snape.  He has a complete change of heart by the time he faces down LV in the Great Hall, but we never see it happening.  

Nikkalmati
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