[the_old_crowd] Re: HBP interview

[Aberforths Goat / Mike Gray]

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Slogan #437: Don't bust a boiler - just write a spoiler!

Slogan #438: Um ... gee ... uh ... yeah. Maybe it's time to get on with
it? Eh? Here, let me help you turn those pages. 

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Pip!squeaked,

> Alright, so it could go either way. Perhaps Snape is evil. But if
> so, I'll feel conned. Harry's unreasoning and unrelenting habit of 
> blaming Snape for everything turns out to be right?

Actually, I think that's the strongest possible argument against
ESE!Snape. Harry needs Snape not to be completely evil so that he can
forgive and be forgiven by Snape. I just think that this comes down to
the kind of things Rowling thinks are important. 

It reminds me of a scene in A Twinkle in Time that Amy (or was it Joy?)
quoted recently, where Meg realizes that the key to defeating the evil
Thingy and freeing her brother, Charles Wallace, is to love her brother.
She would never be able to love the Thingy itself, but Charles Wallace,
yes - even though he has become a pretty horrible being.

It looks like Snape is going to have a Charles Wallace moment in HP7.
Harry is never going to be able to love or forgive Voldemort - Voldie is
simply past that. Even Dumbledore states, explicitly, that he must be
killed. Snape is different, though. He is a human being who has done
wrong but also done right - who can inflict suffering with the worst of
them but can also hurt and suffer as only a true (as opposed to
Voldemoronic) human being can.

Actually, I could even see Snape turning out to be guilty of murdering
Dumbledore - but even then, I think the forgiveness thing will hold
true. 

BUT:

For those who need more textual proof, here's a new one (courtesy of my
neighbor again):

Toward the end of the book Hermione says: 

"I was so stupid, Harry! [....] She covered her face in shame and
continued to talk into her fingers, so that her voice was muffled. "oh,
it's so obvious now, Snape must have Stupefied Flitwick, but we didn't
realize, Harry, we didn't realize, we just let Snape go!"

Good, so Luna and Hermione made the grievious mistake of letting Snape
go. Right?

Weeell. As fortunate would have it, they *couldn't* have made a
grievious mistake. Why not? Just a few pages before, Hermione spells it
out: "Harry, if we hadn't had your Felix potion, I think we'd all have
been killed, but everything seemed to just miss us -"

See? They were so hopped up on Luckyjuice, there was no way they were
going to be able to get it wrong! 

Ergo: Hermione doesn't realize it, but she's wrong. Letting Snape up to
the tower wasn't a mistake. It was exactly what they needed to have
happen.

Eh? (I'll convey your snorts of derision to my neighbor. But I think
she's on the money.)

Baaaaaa!

Aberforth's Goat (a.k.a. Mike Gray) 
_______________________

"Of course, I'm not entirely sure he can read, 
so that may not have been bravery...."