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I've been wondering lately what Snape would have done with his life had he not come under the influence of Voldemort. I doubt he'd have gone into teaching at all. But it occurred to me that we really are not shown such a lot of choice of career in the wizarding world, and this is probably because of the fact that Harry is concentrating on other more pressing matters during his years at Hogwarts. But the Ministry seems to be the big employer, with a few other bits and pieces such as dress shops (Madame Malkin's), inn-keepers (Tom and Rosmerta), Borgin and Burkes, Ollivanders, etc. None of which I can really see Snape working in (although there's a few Snapefen I imagine who wouldn't mind him measuring us up for a new dress at Madame Malkin's LOL!)
I'd love to know of other options the members here might come up with for a satisfying career for Severus. I've written one fic "Back to Basics" where he abandons the wizarding world and lives out his life amongst the Muggles, running a string of naturopathy shops. Of course he'd be successful since his potions would work!
But that then gave rise to another question: would magic potions work on Muggles? We see Mr Weasely in hospital not responding at all well to stitches after Nagini attacked him, so I wondered if the same held true for Muggles' response to potions.
I look forward to the birth of plot bunnies!
Alison
I'd love to know of other options the members here might come up with for a satisfying career for Severus. I've written one fic "Back to Basics" where he abandons the wizarding world and lives out his life amongst the Muggles, running a string of naturopathy shops. Of course he'd be successful since his potions would work!
But that then gave rise to another question: would magic potions work on Muggles? We see Mr Weasely in hospital not responding at all well to stitches after Nagini attacked him, so I wondered if the same held true for Muggles' response to potions.
I look forward to the birth of plot bunnies!
Alison
I was wondering the same thing the other day, from the perspective of Severus as a Slytherin. What were his ambitions before Voldemort got his claws into him? What did he dream of doing? I rather doubt that teaching rooms full of 12-year-olds how to brew Shrinking Solution was at the top of his list....
I saw a fic once (I can't remember which or by who) where Severus, as a child, had secretly dreamed of being an Auror - only to discover after Hogwarts that the people making the decisions about who to accept into the training program had pretty much the same biases as those who had made Hogwarts hell for him.
I rather like this idea. But I also find the idea of Healer!Snape rather appealing, and I think it quite possible that he may even have had some training at St. Mungos before being hired by Dumbles. And of course there is Unspeakable!Snape doing secret research in the bowels of the Ministry, and poor under-house-arrest Severus brewing wolfsbane for the Ministry after the war. Snape living in the Muggle world afterwards is appealing too. There are fics where he's a bookstore owner and all.
I tend to write him working as a healer or in the Muggle world. But that's post-war...in an AU where Voldemort never got to him, I'd say healer (again), maybe Unspeakable, something like that.
Potions: With his highly creative mentality, I don't believe he would have settled for a drudge, mass-production job in potions. Neither can I see him routinely brewing a high-end line of products and selling them out of his own apothecary. No, he seems to be all about the creative process. In my mind he would perfect that high-end line of products, sell the patents, and move on to the next challenge.
Spells: Again, I see him being all about Research and Development. Spells don't seem to be as immediately marketable as potions so perhaps he'd work for a corporation in the R&D department. We're told many purebloods families are very wealthy, but the only example we clearly see are the Malfoys. So perhaps there's a Malfoy Industries that would have snatched him up and paid him well to do what he clearly loves to do anyway.
Was Trevor a magical toad? Because the Shrinking Solution worked on him just fine. And if magical healing doesn't work on non-magical organisms then you'd have to wonder what Filch does if/when he needs medical attention. The stitches didn't work for Arthur because Nagini's venom was dissolving them, doesn't mean they wouldn't have worked in other cases.
"He seemed to deflate under Mrs Weasley's piercing gaze.
'Well -- now don't get upset, Molly, but Augustus Pye had an idea ... he's very interested in ... um ... complementary medicine ... I mean, some of these old Muggle remedies ... well, they're called stitches, Molly, and they work very well on -- on Muggle wounds -- '
Mrs Weasley let out an ominous noise somewhere between a shriek and a snarl. (snip)
'Do you mean to tell me,' said Mrs Weasely, her voice growing louder with every word and apparently unaware that her fellow visitors were scurrying for cover, 'that you have been messing about with Muggle remedies?'
'Not messing about, Molly, dear,' said Mr Weasley imploringly, 'it was just -- just something Pye and I thought we'd try -- only most unfortunately -- well, with these particular kinds of wounds -- it doesn't seem to work as well as we'd hoped -- '
'Meaning?'
'Well ... well, I don't know whether you know what -- what stitches are?'
'I sounds as though you've been trying to sew your skin back together,' said Mrs Weasley with a snort of mirthless laughter, 'but even you, Arthur, wouldn't be that stupid -- ' (snip)
'WHAT DO YOU MEAN, THAT'S THE GENERAL IDEA?'
'Typical Dad,' said Ginny, shaking her head as they set off up the corridor. 'Stitches ... I ask you ... '
'Well, you know, they do work well on non-magical wounds,' said Hermione fairly. 'I suppose something in that snake's venom dissolves them or something.' "
From my reading of that, it sounded like there is a very definite divide between Magical and Muggle healing methods, and that Magical people look down upon Muggle methods as inferior.
That's why I wondered if this was just some sort of Magical bias against most things Muggle, or if there was some basis in fact for their distaste for Muggle methods of healing.
Yes, Hermione does say it *could* be that the snake's venom dissolved the stitches, but I feel if it was merely that, then the idea of stitches in general would not have provoked such disbelief on the parts of Mrs Weasley and Ginny: 'Stitches ... I ask you ... '
We already know that there are physical differences between Magicals and Muggles -- it seems that Magical people tend to live to a far greater age than do Muggles, so I thought perhaps there might be other reasons that Muggle medicine is considered beneath them, 'complementary' as Mr Weasley so condescendingly calls it.
Anyway, it was just a thought.
Alison
Here are some other jobs Severus might like:
-member of the Department of Magical Accidents and Catastrophes (assuming the job required a lot of problem solving)
-Hit Wizard (Department of Magical Law Enforcement officer)...although I think he'd rather be an Auror than that
-Curse-Breaker for Gringotts
For a post-Voldemort situation, I favor moving to the Muggle world. There was a fic where (with Dumbledore's help) he had set himself up as a book critic or editor sometime after Voldemort's return. In that fic the plan involved Obliviation and the blocking of his magic until he was cleared in the Wizarding World. It took a long time. Eventually Hermione gave him his memory and magic back, but he decided to stay put. Anyway a job involving literature could be a good start. But I think eventually, after he gains more of a balance, I'd like to see him become a social worker or a related profession and either return to Spinner's End or a similar neighborhood and work with youth at risk. Because that would be the conclusion after a lifelong lesson that magic doesn't solve the matters of human cruelty and aggression, it only gives people more ways to express it.
:)
Besides teaching or otherwise working at Hogwarts, the various Ministry office jobs and Aurors, and the retail/entrepreneur jobs you mention, we see or can infer:
- Book author, possibly connected to spell/potion research and development (some of the books Harry sees claim to have new spells; if that's the case, someone must be inventing them)
- Journalist (if you can call Rita Skeeter that *wink*)
- Newspaper/magazine publisher (Prophet, Quibbler, Witch Weekly,
- Transfiguration Today)
- Healing/St Mungo's
- Muggle relations (which is probably attached to the Ministry)
- Employment at Gringotts (including the curse-breaking Bill does)
- Training security trolls
- Engaged in making the various specialized/charmed objects we see for purchase in the WW, such as Quidditch gear, wizarding sweets, cauldrons, Ogden's Firewhisky... (besides sale, there must also be manufacture, which in some cases is presumably by the proprietor, but in other cases likely not)
- Dragon-taming/handling (whatever it is Charlie's doing)
- Singer/musician (Weird Sisters, Celestina Warbeck)
- Radio production (whoever it is runs the wizarding wireless)
- Professional Quidditch player
- Work/drive the Knight Bus
- Possibly masonry/carpentry/similar skilled trades, whatever the magic-assisted equivalents are (wizarding buildings and alterations to existing Muggle buildings got there somehow)
I'll stop there, although there's probably more. But as you mention, few of these seem attractive careers for Severus Snape, except possibly an author or publisher of some type. I tend to fancy the apothecary/bookshop/similar ideas myself, as you did with his naturopathy practice.But that then gave rise to another question: would magic potions work on Muggles?
? We know magic works on Muggles. We see it a lot. Why would potions be different than straight wand magic? If you want a specific example, Dumbledore speculates that Merope Gaunt used a love potion on Tom Riddle Sr. If potions were known not to work on Muggles, he wouldn't even suggest it.
We see Mr Weasely in hospital not responding at all well to stitches after Nagini attacked him
Er... but that's due to the specific nature of the wound (magic wasn't able to close it either until they found a specific antivenin), not because Muggle methods are necessarily ineffective against all magically-inflicted damage.
Lynn
Potions on Muggles
The question would be, does Skele-gro work by inducing the bones to grow back, or by inducing Harry's magic to regrow the bones? In fact, the fact that it regrows only the missing bones--rather than giving him extra femurs as well--might suggest that it's working with Harry's magic--Harry's body knows its own template, after all, and knows what needs to happen to be restored to normality.
To be a little clearer--when Tonks healed Harry's broken nose, she was directing a specifc spell. No one was directing the Skele-gro to grow a specific set of bones. I mean, it wasn't Skele-gro-customized-for-right-arm-and-f
Would the Elixir of Life work on Muggles?
Does Wolfsbane need to be brewed differently for Muggle and Wizard werewolves?
Re: Potions on Muggles
Elixir of life - does it work by repairing and lengthening of the telomeres of chromosomes? But that won't be enough, the entire cell cycle control system needs revamping or the Flamels would have developed all forms of cancer known to mankind. And of course keeping the eye lenses clear.
Re: Potions on Muggles
We may not have seen healing spells/potions used on Muggles, but both of the spells cast on Dudley involved growing a significant quantity of tissue in a short period of time: growing a pig's tail, and growing a super-large tongue. In the first case, it also involved growing new skin and *bones*, and was a permanent change that required surgery to remove.
I would conclude that magic *could* be used to heal Muggles, although if some healing does use the patient's own magical resources, different strategies might be necessary for magically healing Muggles in some cases.
Lynn
Some wizard world career choices
Love this blog by the way. I'll have to subscribe.