The Breaking of the Hogwarts Fellowship

[littlemanpoet]

Ooh what a fun bucket of opinions and ideas!

I want to deal with Sources in a separate post.

Originally Posted by Estelyn

Gríma - even the names "Snape " and "Snake" sound similar.

Originally Posted by Cailin

And Snape? He’s definitely a good guy at heart.

Originally Posted by Formendacil

Snape makes me think about Boromir.

Originally Posted by Lalwendë

Saruman is one of the few characters who has turned from the 'good' to the 'bad' and yet even here the comparison is flimsy as Snape has seemed evil, found not to be so, and then eventually been revealed as such...

Originally Posted by the phantom

I'm surprised no one has said that Snape is Gollum, pointing out that they are both complicated and twisted, have flashes of what could be goodness, but generally are evil and are dominated by a greater evil power.

Originally Posted by Firefoot

Snape definitely strikes me as being loyal only really to himself - he'll pay lip service to those higher up but only to keep himself in a good position to move up. He's really only looking out for himself, playing both Dumbledore and Voldemort to his advantage. Power for himself seems to be the theme here - similar to Saruman...

My thought had been Boromir, but with qualifications.

For the record, I agree with those of you who think Snape will turn out for the good in the end. And I don't think he's in it for his advantage. Rather, he's trying to survive. Imagine being in his place. You're one of the more powerful wizards, a former Death Eater; being former, now that Voldemort is back, you are considered a traitor unless you can persuade and convince and demonstrate the opposite, just in order to save your skin. That means Snape is forced to play double agent. He knows that Dumbledore is going to give him the benefit of the doubt, yet is no fool; so he tried to do as much for Dumbledore as he can without appearing to do too much against Voldemort. A tricky proposition for anyone at all! Why he swore that oath, however, I'm still trying to figure out. At any rate, I think Snape is still merely trying to survive, especially having sworn the oath. Did he swear it in order to keep that aunt of Malfoy from getting the mind of Voldemort turned against him? That's the only thing I can think of.