Dragons, Produced and Tickled, and Other Pleasantries

[nrenka]

--- In the_old_crowd at yahoogroups.com, silmariel <silmariel at t...> 
wrote:

> But more particularly, I'd like to express my desbelief that Harry 
> will be able to notice the distinction between an OFH Snape and an 
> ESE Snape. It will be hard enough for him to make some sort of 
> ammends with DDM Snape, but I can't picture him entering in subtle 
> distinctions between evil and oportunist, detatched, egoist... 
> regarding to Snape, of course, I don't say he can't allow it in 
> other characters who are not hated by him, but in Snape, that 
> figure of all that is bad in this world?  

I dunno.  We get some kind of scene with explanations, and we get 
a "Oh, I tried to be good for a while, but I couldn't stand it" 
comment, or something where Snape is disparaging of both of his 
masters--not too hard to realize that this isn't the fanatical 
Bellatrix, but something rather different and maybe even worse 
(depends on your criteria). :)

> I don't notice the difference between being an ill treated 
> werewolf, an ill treated house elf, an ill treated muggle, or an 
> ill treated wizard with an interest in dark arts.

I'm saying that these different messages of discrimination don't 
produce quite the same results; Voldie could do specific things with 
blood as his banner that he couldn't do with other messages.  And 
this is one case where I want to argue for specificity rather than 
thinking in generals, because only that will let us account for plot 
details.  It's like treating fascism, where each instantiation of a 
fascist state has different factors and your model has to be tweaked.

> Nora:
>> Ummm, so non-aggressive snooping deserves a broken nose?
> 
> That comes from the end of OoP train scene, sure, not for snooping.

My copy of OotP presents Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle attempting to 
ambush Harry on the train, and not realizing they're near the DA 
compartment and thus getting jumped en masse.  Again, there's the 
pattern of direct provocation (and thus intention) meriting the big 
stick--and this is the pattern we're always given with Draco the 
instigator.  I just don't see that as the same structural pattern as 
snooping, and there are some issues with playing this kind of delayed 
accounting.  YMMV.

-Nora wakes up nicely past the sun