cereal:

Knut, I think you're on the right track with the Pensieve, and maybe the headmaster portraits will play a part as well in convincing Harry where Snape's loyalties lie.

P-C, I'm not saying that it's a theory held exclusively by Snape worshippers at all. In fact I agree, after reading the arguments here, that it's a possibility. But I wouldn't be surprised if it began as an effort to reclaim Snape.

I want Snape to be a bad guy, honestly, but I think chapter two is the clever way of misdirecting me away from it.

I never assumed Snape was a bad guy. I always had him pegged as a representative of "people who hate you can still be on your side, so you'd better be careful about those snap judgements." A bit of a lesson in tolerance and "it's not about you"-ness.

I feel differently about Snape this time. I guess without thinking I was, I took Harry's view.

If I'd only read the books and not the reactions to, I'd be perfectly happy with Snape being a hateful good guy. I just ... I just want people to be Jossed, I suppose.

I could be nicer.

Go away, Perkins.

connie, that's always been one of the main reasons why I like Snape.

Rereading the book I kept noticing all these details about Harry and Snape's relationship. Several times someone either compares Snape to Harry, or Harry thinks about how much he's learned from the HBP, etc. In a weird way, I think Snape has sort of become another father figure for Harry (although Harry would never admit or even realize this).

Maysa - That is brilliant, because, as we all know, a father is not always a good thing (at least, not until you have more perspective than Harry has, so why should a father FIGURE be?

I've been surprised with Harry's father being showed to be a mean-spirited bastard, more of the theme of "the good guys can be real jerks sometimes". Harry has to come to terms with that, plus his near-gutting of Draco.

I think Dumbledore wanted Harry to see Draco not wanting to kill DD as well. There was the note that Harry feels a bit of pity for Draco now, which means he's stopped automatically categorizing Draco, at least, as "bad guy, not worth caring about." Once you see the bad guys as people, it's hard to demonize them. It's all being muddled up into shades of grey, which is an amazing thing in a "kids' book". No wonder people get antsy about it, it shows life isn't neat.

Between Harry's dad's actions in the Pensieve in OotP and Ron's thoughtlessly cruel comments being not only shown but commented on, I've been rather pleased at the demonstration that being a good guy doesn't always = being good.