(Anonymous)
Loved this essay. I particularly appreciated "The Final Betrayal", but all the sections are great.
Much has been made by detractors of Severus Snape (including, of course, Albus Dumbledore) about the fact that he asked Voldemort only for Lily to be spared.
Young!Snape's ethics may be deficient (where did he have the opportunity to learn any? Not at Hogwarts, that's for sure), but as you and others have pointed out, being prepared to risk his life for another person is surely a positive sign.
It's understandable that Dumbledore reacts with hostility to the sight of a young DE. Most of Voldemort's henchmen are scum. But this DE has put himself at risk to protect another person. Shouldn't that indicate to Dumbledore that the young man isn't completely lost to humanity? Instead he makes a very strange remark: "Could you not ask for mercy for the mother, in exchange for the son?" As if Snape could bargain with Voldemort, and had the power to spare all the Potters if only he cared about them.
Not to mention, Dumbledore's pose there on the moral high ground would look a lot better if he'd ever reached out to obvious high-risk kids like Snape, or done anything else to prevent Voldemort's people from recruiting hand over fist in his own freaking school. But at least, unlike Snape, young Dumbledore never joined any wannabe evil overlords and plotted with them to conquer the world. OH WAIT.
All of these implicit challenges Dumbledore neatly evaded answering, immediately shifting the focus back onto Severus and onto one of his points of greatest emotional vulnerability: "But this is touching, Severus. Have you grown to care for the boy, after all?"
I might tolerate his callousness a little better if he weren't such a weasel about it. He knows perfectly well that he deserves a major part of Snape's reproaches. Why not man up and admit it? I get the impression that in his mind, Snape isn't worthy to reproach him. Probably only Harry "Sir Galahad" Potter himself would be.
I agree, too, that by the time this conversation took place, Snape had developed a conscience. For me, the saddest aspect of the whole series is that he dies at the point when he'd not only grown as a human being, but could have been free of both his masters and maybe even his burden of guilt. I mean, what is there for him in the afterlife? Watching James and Lily cuddle?
-L
Much has been made by detractors of Severus Snape (including, of course, Albus Dumbledore) about the fact that he asked Voldemort only for Lily to be spared.
Young!Snape's ethics may be deficient (where did he have the opportunity to learn any? Not at Hogwarts, that's for sure), but as you and others have pointed out, being prepared to risk his life for another person is surely a positive sign.
It's understandable that Dumbledore reacts with hostility to the sight of a young DE. Most of Voldemort's henchmen are scum. But this DE has put himself at risk to protect another person. Shouldn't that indicate to Dumbledore that the young man isn't completely lost to humanity? Instead he makes a very strange remark: "Could you not ask for mercy for the mother, in exchange for the son?" As if Snape could bargain with Voldemort, and had the power to spare all the Potters if only he cared about them.
Not to mention, Dumbledore's pose there on the moral high ground would look a lot better if he'd ever reached out to obvious high-risk kids like Snape, or done anything else to prevent Voldemort's people from recruiting hand over fist in his own freaking school. But at least, unlike Snape, young Dumbledore never joined any wannabe evil overlords and plotted with them to conquer the world. OH WAIT.
All of these implicit challenges Dumbledore neatly evaded answering, immediately shifting the focus back onto Severus and onto one of his points of greatest emotional vulnerability: "But this is touching, Severus. Have you grown to care for the boy, after all?"
I might tolerate his callousness a little better if he weren't such a weasel about it. He knows perfectly well that he deserves a major part of Snape's reproaches. Why not man up and admit it? I get the impression that in his mind, Snape isn't worthy to reproach him. Probably only Harry "Sir Galahad" Potter himself would be.
I agree, too, that by the time this conversation took place, Snape had developed a conscience. For me, the saddest aspect of the whole series is that he dies at the point when he'd not only grown as a human being, but could have been free of both his masters and maybe even his burden of guilt. I mean, what is there for him in the afterlife? Watching James and Lily cuddle?
-L