InsaneJournal

I read DH over a week ago and have spent the time between then and now at a Christian conference, purging HP from my thoughts, so the following is drawn from my vague recollections of a first-read and reactions to other assorted essays I've stumbled upon on LJ and throughout the 'net, the best of which can be found on my Memories list. 

Overall, I liked it. It was very entertaining writing, as one would expect from JKR, and I surprised myself by enjoying several parts that had absolutely nothing to do with Snape. The first chapter was very promising, with the dark, dangerous undertones, and the next was thrilling and unexpected (Who saw seven Harrys coming?) and tense (A magnificent battle sequence). Everything looked well-set for a wild adventure, a journey the trio have never confronted before, with JKR’s signature humor to color the way. But there were also some basic things and some minor things that I really didn't like. 

Everything went fine until their sneak into the Ministry. It seemed a little strange that after so many months of planning, their only idea was to Polyjuice themselves and knock other people out. Could they not have thought of that in two minutes? And that they would never even consider what to do after getting into the Ministry struck me as unbelievable, especially in Hermione's case. After all the last-minute saves she's pulled, how is it possible that she was so simpleminded this time around? Where were the back-up plans? The alternatives? The "Just in case"s? Did they plan on knocking on Umbridge's door and asking her nicely to please hand the locket over? Or did they plan on Stupefying Umbridge in a crowd of Ministry officials, several of whom are DEs, and hope they could find the locket on her person? So there was a glitch there, but I could live with it. But the rest of the entire Ministry fiasco proceeded to annoy me as well. Why were they so incompetent, so ineffective? Why did Harry pull out Moody's eye from the door when it was clear that everyone paid a good amount of attention to that eye being where it was? Harry might be reckless, sentimental little boy, but he's definitely not that stupid! They would have accomplished nothing (except getting themselves captured) had lady luck not been on their side, yet again. And it was the deus ex machina sort of luck.

I’ve also heard some complaints about the trio’s pointless excursion into the woods. “The real title of book 7: Harry Potter and the Long Camping Trip,” reads an icon (which can be found somewhere on the deathlyh_icons community). I didn’t find it particularly boring (which is no easy feat on JKR’s part), but I didn’t see how it was very useful either, besides providing the angst and frustration requisite for adventure fantasy tales. The only real problem I had with this bit in the book was that they never went to Godric’s Hallow but mucked around in the woods instead and then suddenly decided to visit Bathilda Bagshot after all. From the first, Harry’s instincts were screaming at him to go to Godric’s Hallow, so why didn’t he follow them, just like how sure he was about the Deathly Hallows despite Ron and Hermione’s disbelief.

Speaking of Harry’s almighty instincts, it bothered me that they were always right and that they always served him just when he needed them. Yeah, it’s a nice fairytale to live in, believing that you’ll always come through just when you need to and somehow, even if all your guardians died and can’t direct you anymore, you’ll still always know what to do. But that’s just it. It’s a nice fairytale and it’s completely unrealistic (How on earth did he suddenly know for certain that the mythical Deathly Hallows were what Voldemort was after?). Not to mention, it undermines one of JKR’s main messages: Because if Harry is already destined for this path of his and can’t ever go wrong, then he never really made any choices, did he? It was all inevitable from the first. So what was the point of telling us that it’s our choices who define who we are?

After the camping trip, however, my complaints cease for the most part. I was glued, avidly reading page after page, eager to see what else JKR’s clever, witty mind had devised, how she planned on resolving everything. And everything, really everything was so cool. Their capture by Fenrir Greyback and the careful interrogation, Malfoy Manor and its peacocks :D, the imprisonment and Hermione torture and Ron screaming her name and Wormtail honoring a life-debt only to die for it and Bellatrix being the heartless, single-minded servant to the Dark Lord. The scenes whipped by and there were all these moments of “Finally!” and “Ahhh!” and “Oh no oh no oh no.” And then, Dobby. The Free Elf. And we come back to death, and we watch how Harry deals with it, compare it to how he dealt with Cedric’s death, Sirius’s death, Dumbledore’s death. Harry has matured beyond his years, as we always knew he would, and we exult at his growth, at his finally accepting his role and taking responsibility for himself. And then all that moral turmoil with goblins – nice touch but never thoroughly dealt with. Then, one of the coolest parts of the book, the botched break-in into Gringotts which we’ve known is impossible to break into since the first book and the escape on a dragon.

So all of that was pretty exciting to say the least and kept me hooked. The only thing grander than that section was the end, the Second Battle of Hogwarts. I was so happy with how that battle went, how bravely Neville led the DA and the underground resistance movement :D, how Aberforth reluctantly lent his aid, how the Quidditch Team turned up, how Trelawney pummeled DEs with her crystal balls, how everyone just rallied and rallied around Harry Potter because we’ve always known he was the chosen one. Yeah, there was something epic there, a moment for the history books. We watched our characters, our characters because we’ve grown up with them, take center stage and make history. It was extraordinary.

Fred’s death, though, confused me. Purpose? Unless it was just to show that, you know, “there are casualties in war.” And if Fred absolutely had to go, why couldn’t George have been off-ed with him? Or why couldn’t Fred return as a ghost because he had “unfinished business”? “Holey ears! Geddit, Fred?” I probably wouldn’t have glanced twice at this death had it not been for the fact that the twins are, basically, splinched.

Back to things that annoy me: Slytherin House. Um, what happened to the Houses standing together? To all those noble words JKR slipped into the Sorting Hat’s song?

"Oh, know the perils, read the signs,/The warning history shows/For our Hogwarts is in danger/From external, deadly foes/And we must unite inside her/Or we'll crumble from within." (p. 206-207, OotP, Am. Ed.)

I think we’re all aware that the Houses are just a stereotype, that Hufflepuffs can be intelligent and Ravenclaws can be loyal. Gryffindor doesn’t embody good and Slytherin doesn’t embody evil. I had hoped that JKR would finally demonstrate that point in this last book. Instead, when McGonagall invites the Slytherins to choose, to stay or not to stay for the final battle, not a single Slytherin stays. Slughorn leads his entire House away to safety, and what does that say about Slytherin? What is JKR getting at? I really don’t want to know.

Another annoyance: Ginny. I’ve been a supporter for Harry/Ginny since a friend (*cough* Lily) started advocating Harry/Hermione four years ago, so I’ve been enjoying the build-up to and of their relationship. I’m not sure I’d have said they were perfect for each other before DH (I really hadn’t seen enough of Ginny to decide), but Ginny was definitely the sort of cool-headed, gutsy, powerful witch I could see Harry falling for. More importantly, Ginny seemed to understand him, almost read his internal thoughts, the way Hermione often can. But then DH sullied Ginny’s character beyond repair. We see her in the book acting selfishly and possessively. Her idea of a birthday present for Harry was repulsive, completely inconsiderate and self-serving. Had she considered Harry’s position in the Wizarding world at all? Or failing that, at least Harry’s personal situation? What is she doing, going around distracting him with kisses when nothing can come of it and he really ought to be focusing his attention elsewhere? I had expected so much more of her; there was potential for her to grow as well, but she spiraled instead into a petty, childish girl not at all worthy of Harry.

Speaking of character development, and on a more positive note, Dumbledore’s back story was fantastic: His unbalanced family, his friendship with Grindelwald and their hunger for power, the death of Arianna, and his falling out with his brother. Fitting and believable. The grief and guilt he must have borne all his life is heavy indeed and colors Dumbledore irrevocably. Dumbledore revealed to be the manipulating puppetmaster “for the greater good” came as no surprise to most of the fandom, I’m sure, but it was disappointing to find out all the same that our beloved twinkly Headmaster was capable of sentencing Harry to his death. It even seems very incongruent with his portrayal in previous books.

I think that’s about it for DH in general.

Now I move on to: “Severus Snape was never yours.”

How wonderful it feels to finally be vindicated, to be able to say “Snape is Dumbledore’s man through and through” and not have anyone cast you a dubious look. I cannot describe the relief I felt when I realized that Snape-is-good had finally, finally become canon. If JKR had written it any other way, I would have never picked the book up again.

There wasn’t much question that Snape was going to die in DH. But his death still crushed me more than I was prepared for. It left me feeling numb for two days, and the manner of his death is one of the most grotesque things in the entire series, for me. There are those who decry the ignoble and pathetic death he got, calling it hugely anticlimactic and unfair to the character, and in my emotional moments, when I couldn’t possibly love this character more, I wholeheartedly agree. But I also recognize that JKR intended him to die the spy’s death, quietly, with as little dignity as he had in life. Snape is not a happy character and he never fully attains peace. Okay, JKR, I get it. I don’t like it, I abhor it down to my last bone, and I think you’ve cheated your character, but I get it.

And that’s not even the main problem I have with his end. What left me feeling dissatisfied and jilted was his lack of resolution. What I wanted to see was just how he was going to prove his innocence, how his relationship with Harry and with the rest of the Wizarding world would be reconciled. He has to die – I understand that. He has to die pathetically – I’ll even accept that. But he has to die without any acknowledgment of the life he lived? No, absolutely not. It infuriates me that he never got a chance to speak with Harry with no more lies or disguises between them, for both to see each other as they are. I’m not asking for a Snape-takes-the-Killing-Curse-for-Harry scenario or even a Snape-tells-Voldy-I-betrayed-you moment. I just expected and looked forward to the two of them resolving some of the tension and hatred that had built between them over the past seven years. Instead, Snape dies without any recognition or reconciliation or peace, and Harry doesn’t flicker an eyelash at the revelation that Snape had been laying his neck on the line for him all these years or that Snape had been in love with Harry’s mother for over thirty years. Harry proceeds to go into zombie-Zen mode (granted, he’s walking to his death), and we don’t hear of Snape at all until “Severus Snape was never yours,” which provided only the faintest satisfaction since it was the least of what was expected. “Albus Severus Potter” later on wasn’t nearly enough.

This utter lack of resolution for Snape also presents a disturbing message to JKR’s readers. Again, it is our choices that defines who we are, right? And didn’t Snape make his choice – that final choice revealed in “The Prince’s Tale,” the choice to turn back, to redeem himself? So what did he get out of it? Here is a segment from pir8fancier’s reaction post to Snape in DH:

“And there is really only ONE character in the entire frigging book who chooses, chooses wrong, repents, and then spends the next twenty years of his life asking for forgiveness. One.

…So we have the one person who is human, who has been corrupted and has repented for his "sins," and he is not given a hero's death, he is not even given a voice. He is not even allowed to define his own innocence. His innocence is defined by a memory.”

So when Snape dies that horrible, pathetic, unresolved death, not knowing whether his choice had helped Harry in the end, his redemption itself looks unfinished, uncomfortably hollow, pointless. That can’t be the message JKR wants to send.

And now, that doe Patronus.

I have never shipped Snape/Lily, never believed it possible. There were hints of the pairing in the “Snape’s Worst Memory” chapter, but I didn’t like the idea. Now, I like it even less, since JKR has taken an all-or-nothing stand on love for Snape. I mourn the Severus Snape I knew, the Severus Snape of fandom, the Severus Snape of the last six books. That character was selfish, high-strung, nasty, proud, and competitive; he was intense and complex and ambiguous. DH reduces all of that, all the magnificence of his character, into a single word: Lily. Everything he has ever done in the war cause is attributed to Lily; any emotion or humanity he is capable of is channeled through his love for Lily. Lily Lily Lily Lily Lily – what happened to Snape, the man who hates James and Sirius, who creates spells and curses in his spare time, who stumbles into Voldemort’s ranks, who takes points unfairly from Gryffindor, who banters with McGonagall about Quidditch, who saves Harry time and time again, who becomes Dumbledore’s right-hand man? Can that all be summed up by “Lily”? It makes me want to scream with frustration. Absolutely no one is so simplistic as that and least of all Snape. Again, incredibly unrealistic.

So how do I take to “After all this time” and “Always”? Obviously, the romantic side in me melts into incoherent aw’s because the idea of immutable, undying love, however impossible, is heartbreakingly sweet, especially for a cruel, acerbic overgrown bat like Snape (and all the more tragic as well since it is unrequited love). But the fanfiction writer in me, the part of me that has truly appreciated Snape all these years, is furious. JKR called him “a gift of a character,” unexpectedly so, but it is apparent that he is still no more than a tool, a plot device, to tell Harry’s story, and she’d rather sacrifice his character than tweak the plot. A post-DH text icon reading, “Not my Potions Master, you bitch!” struck a chord with me (angry enough to break out the expletives, yes), but in the end, they’re her books; she calls the shots.

As for “Look at me.” Yes, my heart broke. Yes, it’s still ringing in my ears. Yes, I carry it around with me all day. And yes, it can be interpreted to mean something beautiful and worthy, as bookshop does here:

"Snape's last line is not just about Lily's eyes. It is symbolic on all levels: Look at me. See me as I truly am. Snape, the character who divided readers into bitter camps for ten years, is more than a Slytherin, a Death Eater, a spy, a "deeply troubled human being." He is more than his love for Lily and his hatred for Harry; and even as he is dying, his last line echoes the mystery and the complexity of everything that he is. It isn't an apology, a protestation of innocence, a plea, a justification, or a defense. It is ever Snape - a command and a demand, and a bitter ultimatum.

It is a perfect last line. It is everything I did not know that I wanted Snape's death to be - everything I feared it would be, ignominious and ignoble, washed away by three words. Look at me. See me as I am. Not good, nor bad, nor wise, nor pure - but human, all too human."

If that is the interpretation you choose from the reading, then I applaud you, bow to you. And there have been many, many other interpretations of Snape in DH and his relationship with Lily that render it into something beautiful (see rexluscus’s meta), but I don’t think JKR intended any of it. When she wrote “Look at me,” she was referring distinctly to Snape’s love for Lily – just as she describes Lily’s love overshadowing everything else Snape does. Once again, canon devastates his character. BUT, as  bookshop and Snape fans everywhere are proving, “Look at me” can still mean so much more. Not in canon, no, but in fanon.

Thank goodness there is fanfiction. JKR had a plot she refused to veer from, a simple structure she stuffed the characters into, because, I suppose, she’s a plot-driven writer writing children’s fantasy books with moral themes. Whether or not she truly understood what a character she had in Severus Snape, she was constrained by the plans she had made over a decade ago. Now that DH is published and available to the fandom, we can mold it ourselves, probe it and deepen it in a way JKR was unable to. In fanfiction, the Severus Snape who has captivated me for so long can continue to live on.

Therefore, Severus Snape lives.

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I will be participating in the "Snape After Deathly Hallows Fest." Probably, those who are interested have already heard of it, but anyway:

Because he deserves so much more.
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