Possible Recantation Part Deux
| I was just emailing a very intelligent young friend named Joshua on the "Snape good or bad" thing. And this is the type of scenario that would make sense to me for Snape to have been good. Copied from my email: Here is one Scenario I have thought of that might make things different. John Granger brought up an idea he got from some readers, called "the stoppered death" theory. In Sorcerer's Stone in the first potions class with Harry's year Snape claims he can teach them to "stopper death." (they even say that HBP has 7 references to that incident in Sorcerer's Stone, some direct and some indirect). These readers think Dumbledore actually got killed in removing the Ring Horcrux but Snape has keeping him alive via potions all year. WHAT IF (and this is a big if that depends on various "mechanics" of Rowling's world, like IF you can load a particular curse into something) but WHAT IF Voldemort "loaded" his ring horcrux with an "Avada Kedavra Curse" such that it would be "unloaded" on the person who removed the horcrux (If Snape is DD's right hand man, closer than anyone else, as he would have to be for this kind of stuff going on, I imagine he would have had Snape right there with stuff at the ready for whatever happened when removing the ring horcrux) ... Then WHAT IF Snape's "death stopper" potion magic can involve a modification he invented just for the occasion, by which the original curse is stayed for a while until an incantation removes the "stopper." Snape, being a master of non-verbal spells, might have been able to engineer this spell such that when he mentally spoke the "stopper pulling" spell it appeared that he would be verbally saying the original curse the "stopper" had been holding back; he would actually be thinking something meaning "remove the stopper" but it would appear to others that he was saying the "stopped" curse, in this case Avada Kedavra (like I said, I have a problem with Snape actually performing avada kedavra as a trick). They say Avada Kedavra is unstoppable, but maybe it is only "eventually" unstoppable ... maybe it can be delayed. Of course this begs the question of whether this would be considered "killing Dumbledore" in such a way as to fulfill the unbreakable vow and not die, but I think it would be ... If it was the ring Horcrux, Dumbledore was probably already hit with whatever it was at the time Snape made the vow with Narcissa and probably knew Dumbledore was going to die. |
Comments on "Possible Recantation Part Deux"
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Pauli said ... (October 19, 2005 11:59 AM)
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Merlin said ... (October 19, 2005 3:56 PM)
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post a commentI think the "fake spell" theory is very plausable. All through the 6 books so far, Snape has constantly said one thing and done another. He verbally abuses Harry, but saves him in book 1, reports Harry's coded message in book 5 although he behaves as if he doesn't understand, gives Umbridge fake Verita serum, etc.
Rowling is also known to drop clues like crazy. Think of all the references to non-verbal spells in HBP. Think of the continued references, direct and indirect, to the first potions class, the "draft of living death", etc.
I think to accept, as I did at first, the notion that "oh, well, Snape must have been bad" is to accept a much less subtle and interesting story for shallower, less satisfying one.
I prefer to call it the "visible effects" theory. Ie only the end result being visible and it appearing as though the speaker alone had caused those effects. The real spell is pulling he plug, the effect is DD getting hit with the Avada Kedavra.
But that is just a nit-picky technicality. What I really wanted to say is that I am still on the fence as far as whether or not Snape was good or evil at the time of DD's death. I think he has defintiely been on DD's side up through the end of book 4 and I think he will be on the good side at the end either way too.
Although I am on the fence I am leaning towards Snape as being good even at the time of DD's death. I think the musical connection with Fawkes points that way and I think Grnager has a good guess on Fawkes being the revelation to Harry of the truth about Snape (the more I think of ithte more it hits me that there is probably some very deep connection between Snape and Fawkes that will be revealed in book 7).
Also, one of the things I was never nuts about was the sort of "dry" version in which Snape goes along as as an automatom with the "set plan." I think he and DD had some sort of set plan but I think to overlook the serious duress the situation puts Snape under is to overlook the rick realism of the character. I think DD is really pleading with him on the roof, not necessarily pleading for his life but for something else (maybe to catapult himself into Voldy's complete confidence and risk discovery and temptation. We do not know if Snape ever committed murder or torture, maybe that is a sort of litmus test for Voldy. bu appearing to have murderd if he really did not, voldy might have other ways of "seeing" taht makes it a risk of discovery. And maybe Snape doubts his ability to resist the temptation of his old master in the end)