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We all remember the great Snape debates before DH came out. About where his loyalties were as of the end of HBP, when they changed if ever, how many times they changed. I think we agree that DH settled this question (even if we don't know the exact time-point we know which events triggered the turning points in his path). Another question was how far he went as Death Eater. After DH the consensus in this forum seems to be that canon suggests either at that he did not go as far as killing, or that if he did he fully repented for such killings and healed his soul to the extent that is possible. It is clear from canon that whatever he was as a Death Eater, the man we see during Harry's Hogwarts years is a man with a strong conscience, with a clear view of right and wrong (despite having to act on the edge due to his role as a spy), who does not make light of having to commit harmful acts for a long-term beneficial goal.
But even without ever killing anyone directly, with his own hand/wand, there is much he could have done. The most obvious is the brewing of poisons and other harmful potions that were then administered to innocent victims by others. Then there is the invention of new harmful, potentially lethal spells, and teaching such spells to other DEs, thus resulting in injuries and deaths among their victims. I think the worst I have seen in fanfics is Mengele!Snape - Snape in his DE days using captives (mostly Muggles) to test properties of newly invented potions. Some scenarios get extremely gruesome, with a team of DEs at Snape's command cutting through a still living victim so that Snape could observe damage to internal organs as it took place.
So my question is, would knowing something like that change anything in your attitude to Severus Snape? Is his complete repentance enough for you as a reader to disregard anything, however cruel, he may have done in his dark period, or would the thought that this was a man who may have been capable of such horrors disturb you enough to feel you cannot forgive him completely? Do you think a man who had commited such actions is capable of abandoning them for good or would he always be at risk of backsliding?
But even without ever killing anyone directly, with his own hand/wand, there is much he could have done. The most obvious is the brewing of poisons and other harmful potions that were then administered to innocent victims by others. Then there is the invention of new harmful, potentially lethal spells, and teaching such spells to other DEs, thus resulting in injuries and deaths among their victims. I think the worst I have seen in fanfics is Mengele!Snape - Snape in his DE days using captives (mostly Muggles) to test properties of newly invented potions. Some scenarios get extremely gruesome, with a team of DEs at Snape's command cutting through a still living victim so that Snape could observe damage to internal organs as it took place.
So my question is, would knowing something like that change anything in your attitude to Severus Snape? Is his complete repentance enough for you as a reader to disregard anything, however cruel, he may have done in his dark period, or would the thought that this was a man who may have been capable of such horrors disturb you enough to feel you cannot forgive him completely? Do you think a man who had commited such actions is capable of abandoning them for good or would he always be at risk of backsliding?
Another point to ponder is exactly when these misdeeds occur. Did they occur when Snape was serving Voldemort of his free will, or when Snape was spying for Dumbledore? I'm sure that Snape was ordered to do horrible things, but Dumbledore might have ordered him to do worse (or these worse events might have occurred as an end result of his spying). For example, Snape had to stand by as Burbage was killed. That has to be hard to live with. Snape also had to murder Dumbledore on Dumbledore's orders. Dumbledore says that Snape's soul might not be damaged if he views it as helping an old man, but such a violent act surely would not leave him unscathed. Severus would have to be devious and ruthless in order to maintain his cover.
In review, I would be more lenient toward Snape if he did something because he needed the DE's protection and respect, rather than because he enjoyed it. I would be even more lenient if he had to do evil in the name of the Order. I always viewed it like this: though others risked their lives for the Order, they didn't have to lead two separate lives. Snape did the Order's dirty work and got no thanks.
His love for the dark arts wasn't a huge plus, but it's also understandable. Since he arrived at Hogwarts with a knowledge of dark arts, his mother must have taught him, or he learned on his own. Dark Arts made him feel powerful and protected in uncertain times. I don't buy DD's supposed excuse for keeping Snape from the DADA position, because Snape has to perform dark arts for Voldemort. Snape would likely not be demonstrating dark arts, so who better for the job? It's like a former thief teaching how to protect your home.
He arrived at Hogwarts with a knowledge of some curses, and this is according to Sirius, so should be taken with grain of salt.
He does say it closely after claiming that Severus was "famous for" being "fascinated by the Dark Arts" (although note that "fascinated by" is not the same as having real knowledge of, nor practicing for their own sake), but it's a separate sentence, and he also takes time to call Severus a "slimy, oily, greasy-haired kid" in between them, so there's some conceptual distance between these utterances as well.
The rest of the sentence in question is saying, essentially, that he was precocious: "more curses ... than half the kids in seventh year", if Sirius is correct and not just exaggerating. A lot of things call this claim into question: How did he know what seventh-years did or did not know? Is he comparing it to what he himself knew at that point? How did he know what Severus did or did not know "when he arrived at school", i.e., when they'd barely met? Unless there's a scene we didn't see where Severus rattled a bunch of stuff off or there was a fight that sounds like it would have been rather one-sided, Sirius has to be assuming based on some later experience (or perhaps just repeating rumour).
Anyway, overall it is not clear that he is claiming the curses were Dark, and even if he is, we don't know that he would be correct to say so. Exactly what constitutes "Dark Arts" is very ill-defined in canon.
Note I'm not saying Severus did not know and practice Dark Arts at any point. He must have, to have been the expert in residence for such situations as the curse on Katie Bell and whatnot. I just think think that he was barely getting started during school, and it was more an intense interest than anything else -- a fan, if you will, rather than a genuinely Dark wizard.