Snobby Snape?

[Judy]

I said:
> > I just don't see the whole Snape/Marauder interaction as Snobby 
> > Snape looking down his nose at those jocky Gryffindors.

And Mike responded:
> I think you misunderstood my premise. I concluded that Snape was an 
> intellectual snob from the beginning and that he staked out that 
> position on their first encounter. The dynamic certainly evolved 
> from there and, much to Severus' eventual chagrin, James proved to 
> be more than a simple jock.

Mike also said:
> It was Sev's "brawny vs brainy" comment that clued me in, and that 
> occured before James even showed he could control a broom, much 
> less that he would turn out to be a Quidditch star. Why he thought 
> Gryffs would be "brawny", I have no idea. Severus didn't even know 
> which house would have the better team. But the comment did 
> convince me that Severus looked down on those athletic types, it 
> was code I'd heard before

> I might be cutting James too much slack, but I didn't consider 
> his "I'd think I'd leave" comment as an insult to Slytherin, nor 
> did I think Draco was insulting Hufflepuff. 
> I took both those comments as 
> a 'my house is better than your house' type braggadocio. I mean, 
> don't you have to actually say something about the other 
> house for it to count as an insult? Something besides, I don't 
> wanna go *there*? Now, Severus' "brain v brawn" said with a sneer,
> that qualified as an 
> insult against Gryffindor, to me.
 

Well, even if the premise is that Snape only *initially* believed 
James to be a "dumb jock" and that this led to the hostilities 
between them, I don't agree.  I think that Snape only made the 
comment that Gryffindor's were "brawny rather than brainy" because he 
felt that James was deliberately insulting him, and needed something 
to say in return.  

It looks like a lot here depends on one's interpretation of James' 
comment "Who'd want to be in Slytherin?  I think I'd leave, wouldn't 
you?" So, let me start by discussing that. It's Book 1 where we first 
hear someone say, "I'd think I'd leave, wouldn't you?" in reference 
to being Sorted into a certain House. In this case, Draco says it 
about Hufflepuff, during his first interaction with Harry. This whole 
interaction seems to be set up to give us a negative impression of 
Draco as arrogant and spoiled, if not just plain mean. (Draco also 
talks about "forcing" his father to buy him a broom, calls Hagrid a 
savage, disparages Muggleborns, and strongly reminds Harry of 
Dudley.) 

So, when James uses the exact same phrase in ("I'd think I'd leave, 
wouldn't you?") in reference to Slytherin, I take it that JKR intends 
James to be insulting Slytherin. I certainly don't see it as just as 
James' way of saying what House he'd like to be in. Remember, he has 
overheard Snape talking about Slytherin, and in response, he doesn't 
say anything to *Snape* at all.  Instead, he says  "Who'd want to be 
in Slytherin? I'd think I'd leave, wouldn't you?" to *Sirius*, 
pointedly giving Snape the cold shoulder. If James had just been 
expressing his own desire to be in Gryffindor, he could have said to 
Snape, "Hi, I'm James, and I want to be in Gryffindor." Even if he 
felt a need to express his negative feelings about Slytherin, saying 
to Snape, "Why would you want to be in Slytherin?  That's the Dark 
Wizard House," would have been a lot less hostile than commenting to 
someone else about Slytherin. By talking ABOUT Snape's choice, rather 
than TO Snape, James is clearly being antagonistic here. 

In general, I just can't see saying "I'd leave" as merely a way of 
expressing a desire to be in another House.  For most young magic-
users in Britain, Hogwarts is their ONLY real chance at an education. 
Leaving Hogwarts would mean turning one's back on the wizarding world 
and being a virtual outcast. Think about the terror that strikes 
Harry at the thought of being expelled (he thinks the most he'd be 
able to aspire to is being Hagrid's assistant), and look at the 
isolation and ignorance of  Slytherin's descendents, who refused to 
attend Hogwart's. True, it may be possible to attend another school, 
such as Durmstrang, but that may take connections and/or money – 
Draco is the only one for whom it seems to be a possibility.  
So, "I'd leave" seems to mean, "I'd rather be marginalized and 
uneducated and impoverished than stay in THAT house." I can't see it 
as anything but a major insult.  

Given this context, I think it was very reasonable that Snape felt 
insulted and wanted to say something to defend himself. "If you'd 
rather be brawny than brainy," actually strikes me as pretty mild, 
given what James just said. As a matter of fact, plenty of kids WOULD 
rather be brawny than brainy – probably most of them, I would guess. 
Growing up as an unathletic nerd, I never had the slightest feeling 
that any of the non-nerdy athletes wanted to change places with me. 
So, I have trouble seeing Snape's comment as much of an insult at 
all.  I see Snape's response as a nerd's attempt to defend himself 
and hold on to some vestige of self-esteem after being insulted. 

Mike, I believe you said in a previous post that you've encountered 
intellectual snobs in real life. So have I, but they tended to come 
from a very different background than Snape. The intellectual snobs I 
knew tended to be well-off, with private school backgrounds.  Snape 
is poor (he lives in a "Muggle dunghill," as Bellatrix calls it) and 
seems to have been very isolated prior to entering Hogwarts (and may 
have remained somewhat isolated even after entering Hogwarts, for 
that matter). I just can't see eleven-year-old Snape as a confidently 
smug highbrow.   

I said:
> > I find it amazing that anyone can read the interaction between 
> > Snape and James/Sirius on the Hogwarts' train, and believe that 
it 
> > was Snape who started the animosity.

Mike:
> If I said that Severus started the hostilities, I apologize. I 
> thought I had said that Severus would have opened the hostilities 
> with *me*.

Oh, definitely no need to apologize, and my apologies if I 
misunderstood you. Clearly, though, there were hostilities between 
Snape and James.  So, presumably someone started them.  I see it as 
very much James (and Sirius) who did.  My point was that I don't see 
how it can be read any other way.


I gave my view of how the Marauders interacted with Snape:
> > I see it as a group of four popular kids bullying a kid who
> > was "just this little oddball" (Sirius's description of young 
> > Severus) who was "clearly unpopular" (as Harry observes in the 
> > Snape's Worst Memory pensieve scene.) I don't think the 
> > Marauders bullied Snape because he was anti-jock. I think 
> > they bullied Snape simply because they *could*. 

And Mike responded:
> I have allowed myself to read between a few lines. I have assumed 
> that Sirius' comment about "knowing more curses than most 7th 
years" 
> with Harry's "clearly unpopular" observation and Lily's "I don't 
> like some of the people you're hanging around > 
with!...Mulciber!...D'you 
> know what he tried to do to Mary..." meant that Snape did a few 
> things himself to make these people aware of his leanings. 

Mike, it sounds here as if you have moved from saying that Snape 
*initiated* the hostilities with James because Snape looked down on 
athletes, to saying that James and Sirius were *entitled* to pick on 
Snape.  I clearly don't agree that they were entitled to pick on 
Snape, but whether they were or weren't isn't the question. What we 
were debating is the reason for the hostility between Snape and 
James. Saying that James was entitled to pick on Snape because James 
knew Snape was destined to be a Dark Wizard is a far cry from saying 
that *Snape* initiated the hostilities because he looked down on 
athletes.  

Mike said:
> I have also surmised that in the first few years of the 
> Snape/Marauder dynamic, Snape held the upper hand. Clued in by 
> Severus sitting next to prefect Malfoy after the sorting. 

I saw this as just the standard greeting upon being sorted into a 
particular House, analogous to the scene in Book 1 where Percy shakes 
Harry's hand. Percy's welcome certainly didn't stop 
Draco/Crabbe/Goyle from picking on Harry. Sure, Snape and Lucius 
presumably end up as friends (to the extent that someone like Lucius 
HAS friends), but Lucius was a minimum of four years ahead of Snape.  
So, he wouldn't have been around much to help Snape out if Snape was 
being picked on, just as Percy is rarely around when Draco picks on 
Harry. 


Mike said:
> And I dispute the whole "four against one" argument, since we know 
> that Severus hung with several DEs in training like himself, that 
> Severus gave as good as he got, that he never missed his chance to 
> hex James, and our only actual "bullying" episode was a two-on-one 
> scuffle.

This has been discussed a lot on the main list. Whether you see the 
attacks against Snape as two-against-one or four-against-one depends 
on questions such as the following: What would have happened if Snape 
had managed to disarm both Sirius & James – would Peter and Remus 
have just stood there, or would one of them have at least given back 
James' & Sirius' wands? Unless you think Remus and Peter would have 
done nothing at all while James and Sirius lost, then winning a fight 
would have required Snape to defeat all four of the Marauders. I 
don't think Remus and Peter would have stood idly by if Snape were 
actually winning, which is why I see it as four-against-one. I assume 
you have never have a whole group of kids bullying you? I have. Just 
because they can't all hit you at once doesn't mean that the 
ringleaders' friends will remain neutral. 

As for the rest of your comments here, it seems that there were 
previous attacks by James & Sirius on Snape, because of how Snape 
responds as soon as he sees them. (Harry's impression is that Snape 
expects an attack.) As for Snape hanging out with other proto-Death 
Eaters, we never hear anything about Snape's friends attacking James 
or Sirius. And, Lily asks James what Snape has done to James, and all 
James can come up with is, "It's more the fact that he exists, if you 
know what I mean." Hardly evidence that Snape and his friends were 
bullying James. 



Mike asked:
> But I am curious as to why you call Gryffindor "the jock house"? 
Did 
> you pick up on something that I missed? 

I've seen the following interpretation of the Hogwarts Houses:  
Ravenclaws are the Nerds. Gryffindors are the Jocks. Slytherins are 
the Goths. (Hufflepuffs are – well maybe the Goody-two-shoes or maybe 
just the kids who don't fit the other categories, depending on your 
interpretation of Hufflepuff.)  The nerds-jocks-goths division makes 
sense to me.  I don't think it's surprising that Snape identifies 
Gryffindor with athletics, given the Gryffindor emphasis on bravery 
and action.



Mike said:
> It seems that Severus was trying to defend his territory. He had 
the 
> inside track to Lily's affection (at least in his mind) and he was 
> doing everything in his power to deflect any dalliances that might 
> occur to her. His strength was his brains, he was going to play up 
> his strength and play down anybody (read; James Potter's) strengths 
> as unworthy of notice.

.
> Severus is not about to concede that James may also be smart. He's 
> got his template, Potter the Quidditch hero, bah! Why does he think 
> this may be affective? Lily must have already shown somewhat of a 
> disdain for James. Remember "Messing up your hair because you think 
> it looks cool to look like you've just got off your broomstick, 
> showing off with that stupid Snitch" (2) I'm sure Sev has picked up 
> on Lily's indifference towards "Quidditch heros". Smart move on 
Sev's 
> part to keep Lily's focus right there.

I pretty much agree with this, except that I'm not convinced that 
Snape ever felt he had "the inside track" to Lily's affections.  For 
example, it seems he never told her how he felt about her; I take 
that to mean he suspected his romantic feelings were not 
reciprocated.  I do believe, however, that Snape's love for Lily was 
central to his life and his actions. (I have been on record as saying 
this since early 2002, and of course, the last few books have only 
confirmed my beliefs in this area.)

So, I agree that Snape desperately wanted to deflect any feelings 
Lily might have for James. Given that we agree on this, and given 
that Lily seems to be annoyed by James' status as a "big Quidditch 
hero," I don't really see why you are so convinced that Snape is anti-
jock. I see his rivalry with James as enough to explain his 
disparaging remarks about Quidditch


 Mike said he:
> thinks that James cannot be 
> judged solely by pensieve scene labelled "Snape's Worst Memory" 
> because there were plenty of testimonies in the books from many  
> other characters that he wasn't a bad bloke.

I'm not saying that James was a bad guy OVERALL. He joined the Order. 
He died trying to protect his wife and child. Those are very, very 
positive actions. But, on the topic of whether he was a bully to 
Snape, well, his own son becomes very distressed at this possibility, 
and what explanation do James' two best friends give him for James' 
behavior towards Snape? That James was the best in everything he did, 
and sometimes got carried away and was an "arrogant little berk."  
Not much of a justification, if you ask me. 

-- Judy, loyal Snapefan