| 1 User(s) are reading this topic (1 Guests and 0 Anonymous Users) |
|
Poll: Snape's Love for Lily: how would you characterize it?, Love by any other name? |
|
|
|
 Jun 26 2008, 11:04 AM
|
Official Giggle Loop Coordinator
Posts: 6,997
Joined: 2:55pm January 28, 2005
Location: Classified until such time as the ministry sees fit to release it.
|
Based on what we learn in DH, we can conclude that Snape formed an attachment to Lily at an early age. As Snape and Lily grew older, Snape's memories indicate that his feelings for her went beyond affectionate friendship. By the end of his life, we know his feelings for Lily had never abated and that he still loved her.
The topic for this thread is how would you characterize Snape's love for Lily? Was it a classic example of unrequited romantic love? Or would you characterize Snape's love as obsessive and unhealthy? Was he the forlorn, love-stricken hero-type or the emotionally damaged antagonist who was unable to seek a healthy romantic relationship with anyone else? On what basis do you come to your opinion?
This post has been edited by Pleione: Jun 26 2008, 02:20 PM
--------------------
|
|
|
|
|
 Jun 26 2008, 11:26 AM
|
Cauldron Bottom Measurer
Posts: 128
Joined: 6:31pm March 25, 2008
Location: Space-Time: aren't we all
|
I say A true, deep love that one feels for a soulmate; it saved Snape.
If he didn't love Lily like he did, Snape wouldn't have betrayed Voldemort and spied on him. He wouldn't have worked with Dumbledore against LV if Lily hadn't been killed. And he wouldn't care about Lily if he didn't love her. Snape would've hated her because she was a Gryffindor and she was married to James.
 Wheeeeee! I got the first vote. I feel special.  
This post has been edited by jordan_hf: Jun 26 2008, 11:27 AM
--------------------
As each and every piece of his home swirled around him and into the sky, his body was covered with cuts and gashes. As the last shard hit him and flew up, he collapsed, wondering how long it would be until he bled to death. Crying, he fell asleep; hoping that when he woke up, the house would be there...
|
|
|
|
|
|
Jun 26 2008, 02:44 PM
|
Product Tester at Weasleys Wizarding Wheezes
Posts: 8,229
Joined: 4:57am January 28, 2005
Location: near Muggleswick, UK
|
I don't think any one answer really covers Snape's feelings for Lily. It was certainly a deep and genuine love - it wouldn't have lasted so long if it wasn't, but there was also an element of obsession (he never wanted to share Lily with anyone else, including her friends and family), and an element of blindness - he can't see what is probably obvious to everyone else that being in a relationship with Lily is incompatible with pursuing his dark arts interests until it is too late. I also think the relationship could have worked, Prior to the "worst memory" scene I think both James and Snape stood an equal chance with Lily, James was essentially noble but arrogant and bullying, and Snape was a best friend but with an unhealthy interest in the dark arts and some highly dubious friends. The tragedy of Snape is that he didn't realize this and failed to change in the right direction, but James, whether inspired by James or simply because he grew up, did. But his love did eventually save Snape, because Dumbledore was able to use it to get Snape back on the rails and pulling in the right direction.
--------------------
 W.L.Y.J. We love you Jo |
|
|
|
|
|
Jun 26 2008, 08:51 PM
|
Disgruntled House-Elf at The Leaky Cauldron
Posts: 421
Joined: 1:35am January 6, 2007
|
QUOTE(harrydavid @ Jun 26 2008, 06:10 PM)  I voted obsessive and unhealthy.
Snape never knew the real Lily. He loved someone that didn't exist except in his fantasies. This obsessive love was unhealthy because it destroyed Snape's life. He lived as a tortured, embittered man through and through. Somebody (read Dumbledore) needed to shake him and get him to see reality.
I couldn't have said it better myself. I agree and I would add that Snape's love for Lily was also very selfishly unrequited because it was all about him. He didn't display any desire to do what would really make her happy - be kind or at least civil to her son and respect her husband's memory considering Snape had helped kill him. He did attempt to protect Harry, but he often put his own selfish feelings before that too, like when he quit the Occlumency lessons in OOTP, tried to get Harry suspeneded/expelled with the Minister of Magic in POA, attacked him physically and abusively at the end of HBP and other little moments in which Snape forgot his promise to protect due to his own overblown emotions inside. So yeah, it was all about Snape, an obsessive, posessive, fantasy for a Lily he never really understood and only knew as a girl.
--------------------
In Every Age, A Hero Rises...
|
|
|
|
|
|
Jun 28 2008, 09:56 AM
|
Professional Diagon Alley Window Shopper
Posts: 64
Joined: 7:48am June 18, 2007
|
In my opinion Snape's love can't be characterised by only one of these options. To me Snape's love for Lily contained the following elements:
- Obsessive and unhealthy
- Tragic love that indicates Snape had emotional problems
- Unfulfilled love, that might have worked under different circumstances
- Selfish love
- Snape's love was obsessive and unhealthy, because he never really understood Lily's needs and because he couldn't let go when she chose James over him .
- Snape's love was tragic, because no matter whether his image of Lily was fake, his feelings were genuine. The fact that he couldn't deal with them indicates the emotional distress he was in.
- Snape's love was unfulfilled, but had he received a better upbringing things might have been different. He might have been more mature.
- Snape's love was selfish, because for Snape there was no room in Lily's life for anyone but him.
As a Snape apologetic I'm a bit surprised that the poll contains the option: "Love betrayed! Love that survived despite Lily's actions". I can't speak for every Snape apologetic or fan, but I think that even they feel that Lily was not to blame here. Snape befriended the wrong crowd and his actions and views became more unacceptable as the years went by. By the fifth year they were completely incompatible with Lily's personality. When he called her Mudblood it was Snape who betrayed her, not the other way around. I like Snape as a character because he tried to atone for this, but the mistakes were his.
|
|
|
|
|
|
Jun 30 2008, 09:09 AM
|
Being Chosen by a Wand at Ollivander's
Posts: 2,977
Joined: 12:37pm April 28, 2007
|
I voted school boy crush/ guilt, but having been a school girl with a crush, we shouldn't underestimate the strength of those feelings. After all, look at how young Lily and James are when they realize they are attracted to each other, and they began dating while still in school.
But once Snape was out of school and a full time Death Eater, how did he think of Lily. Did he know Voldemort had approached Lily while she was still in school and she had turned him down? Did he know her life was endanged from the moent own, prophesy or no prophesy--there was no prophesy about Dorcas Meadows or Molly's brothers. They were killed because, like Lily and James, they defied Voldemort and were in the Order.
(This is why I raised an eybrow at Harry's insistance that Snape left Voldemort the moment he threatened Lily. Obviously not, as Lily was still in school and Snape joined the Death Eaters at this time. If he left Voldemort the moment Voldemort threatened Lily, Voldemort would not have known of the prophesy.)
Lily certainly seems to have made no secret of her defiance of the Dark Lord. Yet Snape seemed to feel becoming a powerful Death Eater would impress Lily.
Did he stop thinking this when he heard she had married James, or did he think once the Death Eaters took over she would have to switch alliengiences and maybe husbands too?
Certainly when Snape asked for Lily's life, this is what Voldemort thought he wanted.
It is complicated because Snape's choices and his ambitions are so counter to everything Lily wants and stands for--and he doesn't seemed to have seen this.
|
|
|
|
  Similar Topics
 Similar Topics
|
Sorting is now open for our Prisoner of Azkaban reading groups! Click here to sort!
Shopping at The Cauldron Shop supports this forum!
|
