willowwayne

[willowwayne]

….back from the dead, for a second time. May not be the last! 

Yes, that’s a new chapter. 

I’m going to crawl back into my hole in the ground and shovel dirt on myself to hide ^^; 

[willowwayne]

Two up, two down

We talk about Potter as a timeless series, as quills and parchment will never date, but there are a few key elements which are of their time, and I sometimes suspect that eventually, their original meaning may be lost.

Snape’s house in Spinner’s End is one of these.  If you visit Surrey, a house akin to Number 4 on Privet Drive can be found on hundreds of identical estates.  Indeed, the three-bedroom house with a garage, and both front and back gardens, situated on a private housing estate in leafy surburbia is one that most British people will have strolled through at some point.

But Snape’s house in Spinner’s End is the opposite of the Dursleys’ aspirational abode, and is somewhere that few modern readers will have seen in its original form with their own eyes.  Snape’s house in Spinner’s End is a traditional two up, two down through terraced house, mired deep in a maze of identical cobbled streets, overlooked by a looming mill chimney, and seemingly – by the 90s – entirely abandoned.

The difficulty that some may have in accurately picturing this scene is because these houses, in this state, no longer exist.  A large percentage of two up, two down terraces were demolished as part of slum clearance, which should tell you all that you need to know about the state of the houses.  

Those which remained have been extensively modified – usually knocking down the privy (outside toilet), and then building a two storey extension across the bulk of the yard to create a third room downstairs, and a bathroom upstairs.  Some houses only have a single extension; it is rather common in some areas of the Midlands to have a bathroom that leads off the kitchen downstairs – because the bathroom was the missing room, and it was cheaper to build one storey than two.

Pottermore had an article earlier in the year which explained how the filmmakers originally wanted to film on location, but could not, because the houses simply did not exist in their traditional state.

The houses were typically constructed with two rooms downstairs and two rooms upstairs with a tiny backyard entry leading to the outhouse. Craig actually considered shooting on location, but even though the buildings were intact, they had been brought into the modern era, with up-to-date kitchens and plastic extensions, so the set was built at the studio.

Throughout the 20th century, cobbled streets were routinely replaced by various other road surfaces, namely tarmac and asphalt – and, of course, the scarcity of cobblestones now means that such streets are aesthetically desirable.  However, the cobblestones in Spinner’s End are not an indication of affluence, but an indication of an area left behind. This is further illustrated by the rusted railings, the broken streetlights, and the boarded up windows.

These were workers houses, often funded by the owners of the mill, and therefore tied – meaning that rent was deducted from your wage before you received it.  There were benefits to being in tied accommodation, including being close to work and having a guaranteed landlord – but that was as much benefit to the mill owner as the worker.  Seeing great competition, some mill owners invested in their properties to entice workers – but Spinner’s End is not an example of this; Spinner’s End would’ve been regarded as little better than a slum even when fully occupied.

The narrow streets are indicative of when these houses were built, presumably in the late 1800s – cars were not a concern, and the attitude was to build as many houses on as small a piece of land as possible.

By the time the 90s roll around, and we see Narcissa and Bellatrix descend upon the street, Spinner’s End appears to be mostly deserted.  With the closure of traditional manual industries, families would be keen to relocate to where work could be found.  Estates which hadn’t already been cleared by the 60s would find themselves left to rack and ruin, their former occupants long gone – whether seeking a new life elsewhere, or having died.

For once, Bellatrix is not being anti-Muggle when she sneers at the Muggle dunghill; she is unnervingly accurate. It is a slum by her standards, but most importantly, it was a slum by everyone else’s standards as well.  By the time Severus was born, work should’ve been well under way to clear the area, or to renovate it.  This evidently did not occur – which itself explains how undesirable the area is; nobody wanted to spruce it up - they wanted to leave.  There were no jobs, no amenities, no services – and eventually, no people.

We often ponder why Snape remains at Spinner’s End, but perhaps there lies the answer; he wasn’t just hiding from the magical world, but he was also hiding from the Muggle world as well…

[willowwayne]

Snape, Sirius, and revenge

I’m trying to unpack Snape lately for the fic I’m writing for Snapecase (signups click here!). I’m reading the few pro-Snape posts I can find on here and I have a bone to pick with some Snape fans.

People don’t seem to be in agreement over Snape’s motivations.  Most Snape fans agree that the character is complex and he’s motivated by a sum of different factors. But the primary emotion?  Some people say it’s not love for Lily but revenge for Lily’s murder.

I completely disagree.  Snape is not a vengeful hero.  For proof, look at Sirius Black.  I bring him up because he is one of Snape’s many foils (JKR loves foils and parallels), and their lives mirror each others’ in one specific way.

They are the thematic surrogates of Harry’s parents.  Snape, Lily’s best friend, fulfilling her role as protector.  Sirius, James’ best friend, fulfilling the role of mentor.  (Neither of them do a perfect job, but still.)  Snape is associated with maternal characters (Lily, Narcissa), while Sirius is closer to paternal (James, Remus).  Snape rejects his paternity, yet is trapped in his father’s house.  Sirius rejects his maternity, trapped in his mother’s house.  And from the moment of James and Lily’s death, both their lives are frozen in place.

Sirius and Snape have so much in common–unhappy childhoods, hatred of their legacies, stunted emotional growth, their cruelty, their loyalty, etc.  But the similarities are there to highlight the differences.  They’re a study in contrasts.  Where Sirius loves Harry, Snape hates him.  While Snape is telling Harry to stay out of danger, Sirius is trying to make him a member of the Order.  And on and on.  But here are the two key points I’m taking too long to make:

Sirius is a vengeful hero, driven by righteous anger.  A cunning and vindictive Gryffindor.  His greatest weakness is recklessness.

Snape is a repentant hero, driven by remorse.  A brave and self-sacrificing Slytherin.  His greatest weakness is pettiness.

This is a really important difference.  Sirius’ story is about revenge.  His thirst for justice gives him the strength to escape prison.  You can argue that his primary motivator is revenge on James’ murderers.  Meanwhile his bravery, in the form of reckless hubris, is the fatal flaw that propels him through the Veil.

In perfect contrast, Snape’s bravery is his saving grace.  HOWEVER, in Snape’s narrative, vengefulness is misdirected and childish.  He bullies Harry.  He taunts Sirius.  He outs Remus.  Even his perfectly justified revenge on Wormtail becomes petty because all he can do is make Wormtail clean his house. 

In a way, you could see each characters’ weakness as a mark of their respective House.  Sirius’ reckless bravery is a vestige of the Marauder days where he felt invincible.  Snape’s petty cruelty is Slytherin self-aggrandizement and the type of thing he learned to do during Hogwarts while defending himself from Marauders.  Both things become childish in their adult selves.  (Ironically their adult virtues are traits of each others’ House.)  And if Slytherin pettiness is meant to be a flaw, then revenge can’t be the driving force of Snape’s story.  Just like overconfidence isn’t the defining theme of Sirius’.

So this brings us back to their primary motivations.  The night the Potters died, we know the immediate reactions of both men.  Sirius goes after Wormtail.  His destructive energy is turned outward.  Snape says, “I wish I were dead.”  His destructive energy is turned inward.  (Snape-haters might argue that he’s just being a whiny baby, but this is Snape.  When JKR writes his dialogue, it’s always loaded and important.  We can assume he means it.)  If he was a wholly vengeful character, he would be going after Sirius–whom he already hated and now thinks was the traitor.  But even as Dumbledore’s tells him about the betrayal, Snape will not be distracted from his self-destructive grief.

That night both Sirius and Snape were seized with hatred for the man they saw as responsible for the Potters’ deaths.  Sirius wants to kill Pettigrew.  Snape wants to kill himself.

Dumbledore sees this.  He turns Sirius’ anger toward the cause.  He uses Snape’s guilt in the same way.  You’re obligated to live to make up for what you did.  And this is why Snape can’t be a vengeful hero.  He may want revenge, he may be just as angry as Sirius is–but this is just another similarity that highlights their differences.  Vengeance is not at Snape’s core.  The reason he does all that he does for Dumbledore is guilt.  It’s a story of redemption, not revenge.

Love for Lily, obviously, is at the root of that.  It’s the origin of his guilt, his worst crime.  But it’s just like Sirius’ love for James was at the root of his revenge narrative.  Sirius is Wyatt Earp in My Darling Clementine, seeking revenge against the outlaws who killed his beloved brother…coincidentally also called James.  He’s our righteous hero, out in the sunlight, celebrated by the townsfolk.  Snape is Doc Holliday, a man of vice and crime living in the shadows, jolted out of his self-destructive life by the murder of his lover…Chihuahua (I shit you not, that’s her name).  Wyatt Earp is the shining hero bringing forth justice with his righteous anger.  That’s Sirius’ story.  Doc Holliday may have wanted revenge in his grief, but his overall narrative is one of atonement and redemption.  That’s Snape.

It’s important, I think, to understand this in order to appreciated both their deaths.  Sirius dies before seeing the deaths of Wormtail or Voldemort.  Snape dies a villain and a murderer.  And they both fail to save Harry.  This is the final similarity between Sirius and Snape.  Neither of them live to see their primary objectives fulfilled.  

But Harry is the one to avenge his parents and clear Snape’s name in the end.  This is the natural conclusion to Sirius and Snape’s roles as parental surrogates.  Harry learns from Sirius’ example the importance of fierce loyalty, but also the dangers of recklessness.  Harry learns from Snape’s example the importance of self-sacrifice and the dangers of pettiness.  I’m not saying “Sirius and Snape were basically Harry’s parents” because that’s just stupid.  But Harry learns from them in one specific way children should learn from their parents.  By understanding their flaws and virtues and becoming better than the both of them combined.

EDIT: To clarify, I’m using My Darling Clementine as an example of clear hero archetypes in revenge/redemption stories.  If you’ve never seen it, the actual characters in the film really have nothing else in common w/ Sirius or Snape, so don’t go watching it expecting some sort of HP cowboy AU. ;)

[willowwayne]

Two up, two down

We talk about Potter as a timeless series, as quills and parchment will never date, but there are a few key elements which are of their time, and I sometimes suspect that eventually, their original meaning may be lost.

Snape’s house in Spinner’s End is one of these.  If you visit Surrey, a house akin to Number 4 on Privet Drive can be found on hundreds of identical estates.  Indeed, the three-bedroom house with a garage, and both front and back gardens, situated on a private housing estate in leafy surburbia is one that most British people will have strolled through at some point.

But Snape’s house in Spinner’s End is the opposite of the Dursleys’ aspirational abode, and is somewhere that few modern readers will have seen in its original form with their own eyes.  Snape’s house in Spinner’s End is a traditional two up, two down through terraced house, mired deep in a maze of identical cobbled streets, overlooked by a looming mill chimney, and seemingly – by the 90s – entirely abandoned.

The difficulty that some may have in accurately picturing this scene is because these houses, in this state, no longer exist.  A large percentage of two up, two down terraces were demolished as part of slum clearance, which should tell you all that you need to know about the state of the houses.  

Those which remained have been extensively modified – usually knocking down the privy (outside toilet), and then building a two storey extension across the bulk of the yard to create a third room downstairs, and a bathroom upstairs.  Some houses only have a single extension; it is rather common in some areas of the Midlands to have a bathroom that leads off the kitchen downstairs – because the bathroom was the missing room, and it was cheaper to build one storey than two.

Pottermore had an article earlier in the year which explained how the filmmakers originally wanted to film on location, but could not, because the houses simply did not exist in their traditional state.

The houses were typically constructed with two rooms downstairs and two rooms upstairs with a tiny backyard entry leading to the outhouse. Craig actually considered shooting on location, but even though the buildings were intact, they had been brought into the modern era, with up-to-date kitchens and plastic extensions, so the set was built at the studio.

Throughout the 20th century, cobbled streets were routinely replaced by various other road surfaces, namely tarmac and asphalt – and, of course, the scarcity of cobblestones now means that such streets are aesthetically desirable.  However, the cobblestones in Spinner’s End are not an indication of affluence, but an indication of an area left behind. This is further illustrated by the rusted railings, the broken streetlights, and the boarded up windows.

These were workers houses, often funded by the owners of the mill, and therefore tied – meaning that rent was deducted from your wage before you received it.  There were benefits to being in tied accommodation, including being close to work and having a guaranteed landlord – but that was as much benefit to the mill owner as the worker.  Seeing great competition, some mill owners invested in their properties to entice workers – but Spinner’s End is not an example of this; Spinner’s End would’ve been regarded as little better than a slum even when fully occupied.

The narrow streets are indicative of when these houses were built, presumably in the late 1800s – cars were not a concern, and the attitude was to build as many houses on as small a piece of land as possible.

By the time the 90s roll around, and we see Narcissa and Bellatrix descend upon the street, Spinner’s End appears to be mostly deserted.  With the closure of traditional manual industries, families would be keen to relocate to where work could be found.  Estates which hadn’t already been cleared by the 60s would find themselves left to rack and ruin, their former occupants long gone – whether seeking a new life elsewhere, or having died.

For once, Bellatrix is not being anti-Muggle when she sneers at the Muggle dunghill; she is unnervingly accurate. It is a slum by her standards, but most importantly, it was a slum by everyone else’s standards as well.  By the time Severus was born, work should’ve been well under way to clear the area, or to renovate it.  This evidently did not occur – which itself explains how undesirable the area is; nobody wanted to spruce it up - they wanted to leave.  There were no jobs, no amenities, no services – and eventually, no people.

We often ponder why Snape remains at Spinner’s End, but perhaps there lies the answer; he wasn’t just hiding from the magical world, but he was also hiding from the Muggle world as well…

[willowwayne]

We might have misunderstood Hogwarts Houses for years

I have a theory that the valued quality of each of the four Houses isn’t really about the personality of its students.

The valued quality of each of the four Houses has to do with how they perceive magic.

Stick with me a second: Hogwarts is a school to study magic. Magic as Hogwarts teaches it can be seen as many things: a natural talent, a gift, a weapon, etc.

So how you believe magic should be used will both reflect your personality and change how you handle that power.

“Their daring, nerve, and chivalry set Gryffindors apart,” Gryffindors perceive magic as a weapon. Gryffindors tend to excel in aggressive forms of magic, like offensive and defensive spells, and they are good at dueling. But a true Gryffindor knows that the power is a responsibility, and so they must always use their powers to stand up for what’s right. They are the sword of the righteous, which makes them as good at Defense Against the Dark Arts as they are at combat magic.

Hufflepuffs believe that magic is a gift and that the best gifts are to be given away. Hufflepuffs, “loyal and just,” would naturally abhor the idea of jealously guarding magic or using it to hurt someone else. So Hufflepuffs share their magic to benefit of Muggles, like the Fat Friar, to protect the overlooked, like Newt Scamander with his creatures, or to oppose those who would use magic to torment and bully, like the Hufflepuffs who stood with the DA and the battle of Hogwarts.

Slytherins are the opposite: they believe their magic is a treasure that they have been entrusted to protect. The Slytherin fascination with purity, with advantage, with cunning and secrecy–all of which were perverted by the Death Eaters–comes from the idea that people with magic in their veins have been given something special that it is their duty to protect at all costs. And perhaps they aren’t entirely wrong: power in the wrong hands can be dangerous. And power interfering at will with Muggle affairs is a gross presumption that could turn the course of history. Though the series shows some of the worst that Slytherin can be, “evil,” is not a natural Slytherin tendency. “Cautious,” is.

Ravenclaws believe that magic is an art form, one that is beautiful and should be appreciated and studied for its own sake. If “wit beyond measure is man’s greatest treasure,” then asking what magic is for is useless. It’s more important to immerse oneself in magic for its own sake. Ravenclaws push the boundaries of magic to see if they can, hence Hermione’s spell experiment on the DA coins being dubbed a Ravenclaw quality, but like Luna Lovegood in the pursuit of extraordinary creatures: they can also be content to plumb the depths of what already exists.

So while you can see where personalities will overlap over Houses, perhaps in Sorting we should be asking ourselves less what we think we are and more what we think we believe. 

[willowwayne]

a l l   w a s   w e l l

[willowwayne]

Happee Birthdae Harry Potter! (31st July, 1980)

[willowwayne]

The whole shack shivered and Harry sat bolt upright, staring at the door. Someone was outside, knocking to come in. — Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone

Happy 37th Birthday, Harry! 

[willowwayne]

Happy 20th birthday of the publication of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone! (July 26th, 1997)

[willowwayne]

Gender roles in a nutshell: the Beauxbatons and Durmstrang entrances in The Goblet of Fire.

[willowwayne]

Favorite AU

Belated Day 26 submission for the Snape Appreciation Month!

I love any AU that produces happier Severus (and happier Harry) as end results, but these days I want to see more and more an AU where the Potters don’t die and the First War goes on after Severus Snape turned a spy for the Order of the Phoenix. I don’t care if Pettigrew slipped on the stairs and could not make it to Voldemort, or Voldy just miraculously changed his mind in killing off the baby who’s prophesied to be his downfall. So the Potters might still be living in the safe house under Fidelius, but perhaps can attend order meetings from time to time, Harry grows up with all the loving adults in his life (but with Lily’s guiding influence so as not to become insufferably spoiled), the Order works hard to get things done, and Snape the unknown Dumbledore’s spy becomes invaluable to the war efforts. And one day he is revealed to be the spy to the old crowd!

I think of this AU because I am not so secretly a sucker for angst, but also because I want to see the victory against Voldy more... whole. Of course there will still be deaths and pains behind the scenes if the First War wages on, but the characters we know and love will not die in this AU, and Severus will not carry the burden of inadvertently contributing to the death of the most precious person in his world. I believe it will do wonders for his mental health and self-care in the long run, even though it means his spying years getting prolonged. It’ll be super if he gets some recognition and rewards for his hard work, too.

[willowwayne]

For Snape Appreciation Month 2017

Day 26. Favorite AU My Favorite AU of Snape is that after the war, he survives and lives in a cottage by the sea and drinks Scotch every night at precisely 11. He makes potions for a shop down the road (a ployjuiced disguise of course) and gets a little money for it. Peaceful and Happy. That’s how I like it.

[willowwayne]

Snape Appreciation Month: Day #26 - Favourite AU

The one in which Severus lives and finally finds peace and happiness.

I don’t really demand much, right? I don’t even expect him to be hailed the ultimate hero or something. What I want for him is a quiet life somewhere, probably far away from the wizarding world and quite possibly with the wizarding world believing him dead.

(After feigning his death, he went on a long trip to the continental Europe. At some point he even visited northern Russia, where he met a very… unusual witch called “Baba Yaga” by locals and where he even got a new wand with a feather of a zhar-ptitsa (firebird). And then he came back to the United Kingdom and found himself a small house in a muggle neighbourhood. And there he lives happily - ever after - with a used-to-be-stray cat called Monster. The cat earned himself the name because of the many scars that he bears.)

[willowwayne]

Favorite Fanworks

Disclaimer: I’m an incurable multi-shipper.

At first I wanted to track down every fic I’ve ever read and make a master list of my favorite Snape fics, but time’s a scarce resource these few days and I’m running late for Day 25, so here’s the quick attempt at compiling my favorite fics. Since I’m doing this with time efficiency in mind, I’ll stick to the fics I’ve got bookmarked either on AO3 or FF.net.

1. Snarry

The Boy Who Died A Lot and Chrysalis by starcrossedgirl 

Protosnape by suitesamba (post-war AU)

Imaginis by Leela (EWE, bookstore-owner Snape, portrait RAB)

Harry Potter and the Poison Pen by Diana Williams (post-war AU)

Between the Lines by Dementordelta (HBP-divergent AU)

A Time to Forget by GatewayGirl (sort of de-aging, sort of epilogue compliant) 

1-1. Snarriet

The Never-Ending Road by laventadorn (hands down my favorite Snarriet, I love it to the point that I’m translating this >500k fic)

2. Snily

Come Once Again and Love Me by laventadorn 

The Apprentice by Deborah Peters (abandoned since 2011, but still worth a read)

3. Snape mentors Harry fic

Moment of Impact by suitesamba 

Better Be Slytherin by jharad17 (abandoned at Year 1, Slytherin Harry)

Far Beyond a Promise Kept by oliver.snape 

4. Snamione

Pet Project by Caeria

Pride of Time by Anubis Ankh 

5. Snack (*I’d like to read more of this ship, but can’t really find a lot...)

Walking the Monochrome by emilywaters1976 (post-First War AU)

6. Quite a bit OOC Snape but still enjoyable gen fics

The Wendell That Wasn’t by opalish (canon compliant one-shot, ghost Snape crack fic; OOC in that I believe Snape would never become a ghost, but the characterization’s hilariously Snape)

It Falls to the Young by Viskii (it’s really not the Snape as we know him, but it’s a fun read, and I have a secret fondness for the young Snape-befriending-the-Marauders-somehow-despite-their-rocky-start story; wish there’s more out there)

[willowwayne]

Day 25.  Favourite Fanwork

art by Aileine (x)

[willowwayne]

Snape Appreciation Month: Day #24 - Favourite Moment

Together they peered around the bush at the other bank. Snape had regained consciousness. He was conjuring stretchers and lifting the limp forms of Harry, Hermione and Black onto them. A fourth stretcher, no doubt bearing Ron, was already floating at his side. Then, wand held out in front of him, he moved them away towards the castle. (PoA, chapter 21).

Some may find it a strange choice, I suppose. However, I’d say that this fragment shows well what Severus Snape is like. All that talk about giving Sirius to Dementors and what? Here he is, collecting all the unconscious and bringing them back to the castle. Not only that. He actually makes sure that all of them are comfortably rested on the stretchers. Should I add that he is quite possibly suffering from a concussion himself at that moment? Three spells at once had knocked him down and I doubt that Sirius’ approach to transporting him actually had improved the matter.

I think that this, much better than many other things, shows that what Severus says and what he does are two completely different things.

[willowwayne]

Favorite quotes

Couldn’t pick only one, so decided to do a quote from each book. 

Book 1:

“I can teach you how to bottle fame, brew glory, even stopper death--if you aren’t as big a bunch of dunderheads as I usually have to teach.”

(well, isn’t that obvious)

Book 2:

"Or maybe,” said a very cold voice right behind them, “he’s waiting to hear why you two didn’t arrive on the school train.”

(predictably)

Book 3:

“What would your head have been doing in Hogsmeade, Potter?” said Snape softly. “Your head is not allowed in Hogsmeade. No part of your body has permission to be in Hogsmeade.”

Book 4:

“Then flee,” said Snape’s voice curtly, “Flee, I will make your excuses. I, however, am remaining at Hogwarts.”

Book 5:

“I told you to empty yourself of emotion!” 

“Yeah? Well, I’m finding that hard at the moment,” Harry snarled.

“Then you will find yourself easy prey for the Dark Lord!” said Snape savagely. “Fools who wear their hearts proudly on their sleeves, who cannot control their emotions, who wallow in sad memories and allow themselves to be provoked so easily--weak people, in other words--they stand no chance against his powers!” (...) “Master yourself!” spat Snape. “Control your anger, discipline your mind!”

(emphasis mine; does anyone smell self-loathing between the lines?)

Book 6:

“Well, Wormtail’s here, but we’re not counting vermin, are we?”

(yeah, no “DON’t CALL ME COWARD!” because that’s just too painful; incidentally, Spinner’s End is also my favorite chapter)

Book 7:

“And my soul, Dumbledore? Mine?”