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I have this post on Sirius and Regulus and East of Eden I keep thinking about putting up. I think the trouble with it is that I can't stop babbling in it, just wandering off and wondering how things could be, given that we have zero to no canon about them.
Today, though, I was thinking about
In an interview about Six Feet Under Alan Ball, rather wonderfully, referred to the character of Rico Diaz as the tragically underappreciated adopted son or something to that affect. I loved that because I thought that was absolutely true--Rico was brought into the business by Nathaniel Fisher, Sr. He was the most interested in Fisher & Sons, the business, and he was the most talented (he was an artist at reconstruction). Yet he could never quite be part of the family, and so part of the business. In a very real way he was one of the the "Sons" of Fisher & Sons, but was never really seen that way. Mostly the way he was treated as a son, imo, was to be resented by the real sons when they felt inadequate.
That made me think about how I always felt Krycek was a lot like that in The X-files. Mulder and Spender were both the legitimate sons of Bill Mulder and CSM (or both of CSM, damn you, Chris Carter), and Krycek was the outsider fighting his way into the Conspiracy. Although Krycek was more determined and willing, it was Mulder and Spender who were the desirable ones because they were blood.
So what does that have to do with Snape? Well, nothing. Or not much, exactly. It's just that I was thinking about Snape and Sirius. The two characters have a pretty intense relationship in canon. We are first told by DD in PS/SS that Snape hates Harry because he and Harry's father hated each other. Certainly Snape hates Harry because he reminds him of James, and both Sirius and Snape are accused of mistaking Harry for his father. So while James and Sirius were best friends, and Snape and James hated each other, James also provides a sort of focal point around which Sirius and Snape hate each other.
However, since I'm somebody who really likes family sagas, and in HP I think all the family sagas are the tragedies on the Dark Side of the book (the Weasleys have their drama and their dysfunction, but it's mostly rooted in the present...it's just not the operatic drama of the Blacks), I can't help but think about Snape as a Black. Sirius leaves his family and is blasted off the family tree. He goes to a family on the "good" side, the Potters, and they become his family. In the present time Sirius is considered a member of that family, I would say.
But what about Snape? The post-HBP interest in Regulus begs the question of what, if any, relationship Snape and Regulus had. Regulus was the son who stayed on the family tree. Even after rejecting the DEs, he was still a loyal Black as far as we know. They were both DEs together. HBP makes a point of bringing Regulus into the fold, even if you don't think he is R.A.B. (which I think he is). Slughorn first brings him up as a Slytherin, "I got [Sirius'] brother Regulus when he came along." (He sees the Black boys as "a matched set.") I can't find the other quote, but I know there's somewhere where someone says that Regulus only lived a few days after leaving the DEs. Iow, although we never heard of the lad before OotP, everyone is on a first name basis with him. Well, that's part of the fun of a coming-of-age mystery. All the adults know more than you do, because they were all alive then. How was Harry to know he should worry about Regulus when he didn't know he existed, and then when he did know Sirius acted like he wasn't important?
It becomes very tempting to imagine Snape, who is the same age as Sirius, replacing him in a way in the family's eyes. We have no evidence that Regulus looked at Snape the way he had at Sirius, but there's just something interesting about Snape being at Grimmauld Place given that he was (or is) more in line with what the house represents. (It adds some nice possibilities for the fact he won't stay for dinner.)
The main reason for thinking of it is that in HBP Snape *is* there helping the Blacks. Narcissa (Black) Malfoy comes to him for help protecting her son (also a Black). Snape and Bellatrix (Black) LeStrange seem to know each other very well. Narcissa references Snape's friendship with Lucius (Sirius had earlier called Snape Lucius' lapdog), but while we know he and Lucius have a relationship it's the Blacks with whom Snape seems the most bound up: Draco, Narcissa, Bellatrix and Sirius. Snape may not be "family" in their Pureblood eyes, but their ties seem almost as close. Had Sirius not been a "blood traitor" he might have been the one his cousin, Narcissa, went to for protection for her son as head of the family. He might have been the one sniping with Bellatrix. (I can see him making a UV as well, if not necessarily this one.) Harry tells us Snape seems to like Draco the very first day of class. Has he met him before? Is it just that Draco was Lucius' son, or is Snape close with Draco's family? And by Draco's family, I mostly mean the Blacks, since those are the relatives we usually see in canon? This storyline is a family drama, with Voldemort being simply the outside influence. In fact, Voldemort seems to spend the whole year picking on Draco.
It makes me wonder, thinking back on OotP, if Snape ever spent time in the house at Grimmauld Place the way Sirius stayed with the Potters. He wasn't best buddies with Regulus as far as we know, but he may have gotten involved with the whole family during Voldemort's first rise. Fanon has often named Snape Draco's godfather and while this might not be literally true he is rather acting as one in HBP.
Maybe the other reason I wonder about this comes down to house elves. Besides being hilarious when he waxed rhapsodic over Draco's bone structure in HBP, Kreacher was also very serious in considering him a Black. Dobby betrayed the Malfoys to serve Harry Potter; Kreacher betrayed Sirius and would love to serve the last of the Blacks. I think maybe it's the fact that I think of Kreacher as part of the Black family that made me start thinking about Snape this way.
Snape may be a Prince, but he's a half-blood. He's not married--Pureblood ideology makes it impossible for him to marry himself into the kind of family he supported as a DE. But that doesn't mean he didn't fashion himself some place in that family. It's interesting for me to think that that might drive some of his confrontations with Sirius as well. Sirius may have left his family behind and said good riddance, but would he really like the idea of Snape getting a spot in it? I don't think it's too wild an idea to think that Snape would have coveted a spot in that family. He was a DE, he supported the ideology (I don't think you can surgically remove Pureblood Mania from the DE ideology so that Snape's not a bigot), he used Mudblood as an insult at least once. Sirius compares him to a Pureblood's lapdog. The name Half-blood Prince could mean he's a Prince among half-bloods, or it can also be Snape claiming a place for himself in the wizarding side of his family. He's a half-blood, but he's still a Prince. He did perhaps want a wizard family. (Can't blame the man there--look at Harry and Hermione!)
I have no idea what really went on. It just seems like there's some good potential for something in the fact that Snape plays such a huge part in the Black family drama of HBP, taking over as the patriarch in some ways, when Sirius was so defined by being an Outsider. Not that Snape's role goes completely smoothly. Bellatrix is obviously suspicious of him, but more on Voldemort's behalf. Draco is potentially even more interesting on that score, since just as Snape steps into a father's role Draco becomes rebellious and suspicious. One wonders if there's a "you're not my father!" lurking there somewhere, with Draco projecting some of his anger about his father onto Snape. I've always liked the fact that when Snape and Draco argue the thing that makes Draco lose it and stomp off in a huff is when Snape responds to his claim that Snape is trying to steal his glory by saying he knows Draco is upset about his father. Seems like Snape doesn't buy that glory stuff either.
Anyway, I guess I haven't actually said anything. It's just an interesting aspect to Snape and Sirius' relationship. In the fight between the two in OotP, Sirius, in one of his Black-est (and Draco-ish) moments, leans back in his chair lazily and, speaking to the ceiling, says, "You know, I think I'd prefer it if you didn't give orders here, Snape. It's my house, you see." This creates an "ugly flush" in Snape's pallid face. He then becomes quietly waspish, and hits Sirius with the charge of being useless. Harry later remembers this and claims Snape goaded Sirius into leaving the house, implying he was a coward. It's certainly true that this is Sirius' sore spot. Could Snape have pulled it out because Sirius had hit his own sore spot by claiming the Black House as his own and speaking to Snape like an unworthy guest in it? Not even a poor relation? That ugly flush seems a bit much for the remark Sirius made otherwise, at least to me. Perhaps Sirius was really was pulling out the Pureblood Black card, without Harry realizing it. If Snape longed to be a real Black, I could certainly see Sirius mocking him about it.
Today, though, I was thinking about
In an interview about Six Feet Under Alan Ball, rather wonderfully, referred to the character of Rico Diaz as the tragically underappreciated adopted son or something to that affect. I loved that because I thought that was absolutely true--Rico was brought into the business by Nathaniel Fisher, Sr. He was the most interested in Fisher & Sons, the business, and he was the most talented (he was an artist at reconstruction). Yet he could never quite be part of the family, and so part of the business. In a very real way he was one of the the "Sons" of Fisher & Sons, but was never really seen that way. Mostly the way he was treated as a son, imo, was to be resented by the real sons when they felt inadequate.
That made me think about how I always felt Krycek was a lot like that in The X-files. Mulder and Spender were both the legitimate sons of Bill Mulder and CSM (or both of CSM, damn you, Chris Carter), and Krycek was the outsider fighting his way into the Conspiracy. Although Krycek was more determined and willing, it was Mulder and Spender who were the desirable ones because they were blood.
So what does that have to do with Snape? Well, nothing. Or not much, exactly. It's just that I was thinking about Snape and Sirius. The two characters have a pretty intense relationship in canon. We are first told by DD in PS/SS that Snape hates Harry because he and Harry's father hated each other. Certainly Snape hates Harry because he reminds him of James, and both Sirius and Snape are accused of mistaking Harry for his father. So while James and Sirius were best friends, and Snape and James hated each other, James also provides a sort of focal point around which Sirius and Snape hate each other.
However, since I'm somebody who really likes family sagas, and in HP I think all the family sagas are the tragedies on the Dark Side of the book (the Weasleys have their drama and their dysfunction, but it's mostly rooted in the present...it's just not the operatic drama of the Blacks), I can't help but think about Snape as a Black. Sirius leaves his family and is blasted off the family tree. He goes to a family on the "good" side, the Potters, and they become his family. In the present time Sirius is considered a member of that family, I would say.
But what about Snape? The post-HBP interest in Regulus begs the question of what, if any, relationship Snape and Regulus had. Regulus was the son who stayed on the family tree. Even after rejecting the DEs, he was still a loyal Black as far as we know. They were both DEs together. HBP makes a point of bringing Regulus into the fold, even if you don't think he is R.A.B. (which I think he is). Slughorn first brings him up as a Slytherin, "I got [Sirius'] brother Regulus when he came along." (He sees the Black boys as "a matched set.") I can't find the other quote, but I know there's somewhere where someone says that Regulus only lived a few days after leaving the DEs. Iow, although we never heard of the lad before OotP, everyone is on a first name basis with him. Well, that's part of the fun of a coming-of-age mystery. All the adults know more than you do, because they were all alive then. How was Harry to know he should worry about Regulus when he didn't know he existed, and then when he did know Sirius acted like he wasn't important?
It becomes very tempting to imagine Snape, who is the same age as Sirius, replacing him in a way in the family's eyes. We have no evidence that Regulus looked at Snape the way he had at Sirius, but there's just something interesting about Snape being at Grimmauld Place given that he was (or is) more in line with what the house represents. (It adds some nice possibilities for the fact he won't stay for dinner.)
The main reason for thinking of it is that in HBP Snape *is* there helping the Blacks. Narcissa (Black) Malfoy comes to him for help protecting her son (also a Black). Snape and Bellatrix (Black) LeStrange seem to know each other very well. Narcissa references Snape's friendship with Lucius (Sirius had earlier called Snape Lucius' lapdog), but while we know he and Lucius have a relationship it's the Blacks with whom Snape seems the most bound up: Draco, Narcissa, Bellatrix and Sirius. Snape may not be "family" in their Pureblood eyes, but their ties seem almost as close. Had Sirius not been a "blood traitor" he might have been the one his cousin, Narcissa, went to for protection for her son as head of the family. He might have been the one sniping with Bellatrix. (I can see him making a UV as well, if not necessarily this one.) Harry tells us Snape seems to like Draco the very first day of class. Has he met him before? Is it just that Draco was Lucius' son, or is Snape close with Draco's family? And by Draco's family, I mostly mean the Blacks, since those are the relatives we usually see in canon? This storyline is a family drama, with Voldemort being simply the outside influence. In fact, Voldemort seems to spend the whole year picking on Draco.
It makes me wonder, thinking back on OotP, if Snape ever spent time in the house at Grimmauld Place the way Sirius stayed with the Potters. He wasn't best buddies with Regulus as far as we know, but he may have gotten involved with the whole family during Voldemort's first rise. Fanon has often named Snape Draco's godfather and while this might not be literally true he is rather acting as one in HBP.
Maybe the other reason I wonder about this comes down to house elves. Besides being hilarious when he waxed rhapsodic over Draco's bone structure in HBP, Kreacher was also very serious in considering him a Black. Dobby betrayed the Malfoys to serve Harry Potter; Kreacher betrayed Sirius and would love to serve the last of the Blacks. I think maybe it's the fact that I think of Kreacher as part of the Black family that made me start thinking about Snape this way.
Snape may be a Prince, but he's a half-blood. He's not married--Pureblood ideology makes it impossible for him to marry himself into the kind of family he supported as a DE. But that doesn't mean he didn't fashion himself some place in that family. It's interesting for me to think that that might drive some of his confrontations with Sirius as well. Sirius may have left his family behind and said good riddance, but would he really like the idea of Snape getting a spot in it? I don't think it's too wild an idea to think that Snape would have coveted a spot in that family. He was a DE, he supported the ideology (I don't think you can surgically remove Pureblood Mania from the DE ideology so that Snape's not a bigot), he used Mudblood as an insult at least once. Sirius compares him to a Pureblood's lapdog. The name Half-blood Prince could mean he's a Prince among half-bloods, or it can also be Snape claiming a place for himself in the wizarding side of his family. He's a half-blood, but he's still a Prince. He did perhaps want a wizard family. (Can't blame the man there--look at Harry and Hermione!)
I have no idea what really went on. It just seems like there's some good potential for something in the fact that Snape plays such a huge part in the Black family drama of HBP, taking over as the patriarch in some ways, when Sirius was so defined by being an Outsider. Not that Snape's role goes completely smoothly. Bellatrix is obviously suspicious of him, but more on Voldemort's behalf. Draco is potentially even more interesting on that score, since just as Snape steps into a father's role Draco becomes rebellious and suspicious. One wonders if there's a "you're not my father!" lurking there somewhere, with Draco projecting some of his anger about his father onto Snape. I've always liked the fact that when Snape and Draco argue the thing that makes Draco lose it and stomp off in a huff is when Snape responds to his claim that Snape is trying to steal his glory by saying he knows Draco is upset about his father. Seems like Snape doesn't buy that glory stuff either.
Anyway, I guess I haven't actually said anything. It's just an interesting aspect to Snape and Sirius' relationship. In the fight between the two in OotP, Sirius, in one of his Black-est (and Draco-ish) moments, leans back in his chair lazily and, speaking to the ceiling, says, "You know, I think I'd prefer it if you didn't give orders here, Snape. It's my house, you see." This creates an "ugly flush" in Snape's pallid face. He then becomes quietly waspish, and hits Sirius with the charge of being useless. Harry later remembers this and claims Snape goaded Sirius into leaving the house, implying he was a coward. It's certainly true that this is Sirius' sore spot. Could Snape have pulled it out because Sirius had hit his own sore spot by claiming the Black House as his own and speaking to Snape like an unworthy guest in it? Not even a poor relation? That ugly flush seems a bit much for the remark Sirius made otherwise, at least to me. Perhaps Sirius was really was pulling out the Pureblood Black card, without Harry realizing it. If Snape longed to be a real Black, I could certainly see Sirius mocking him about it.
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I think his preference for Lily and indifference for Snape has to do with more than their blood status; from what little we've seen, Snape-the-teenager was not exactly charming. Slughorn might have not thought his enough of a "high-flyer", like Arthur Weasley. Any help or useful connections that Lily might have received from being in the "Slug Club" were not available to Snape.
And to bring this back to Sirius... Lily and Snape were both in a position to need the "leg-up" from Slughorn. For Sirius, I think it was entirely optional (if I'm correct in thinking that his family name/reputation would have opened any door for him).
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Not to make Snape sound like a poor victim here. It's just that I don't think Lily and Hermione's being included in the Club really prove that Slughorn doesn't have a lot of Prejudice. He does seem to consider Lily's status a big deal, and he may reach out to Hermione partly because she's Harry's friend (thus connected) and partly because she's Harry's Muggleborn friend (whom Harry brought up himself). He may notice her not only because of her skills but because he's making a point to Harry and luring him in. It works, too, in terms of the fact that Hermione tries to get Harry interested in the meetings.
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But when you say entirely optional, are you referring to membership in the Slug Club? When Slughorn tells us about the Black brothers (or maybe the Black family in general), and about the missed opportunity with Sirius, I rather got the feeling that he was speaking in terms of Slytherin the House, not in terms of his club. His major disappointment was that Sirius was in Gryffindor; which, as we've seen, would not have been a problem when considering him for the Club. So both he and Regulus may or may not have been in the Club itself.
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Oh, that's right! He was talking about Slytherin (at least, I think he was). I was talking about joining the Slug Club, which now that you've reminded me, was open to Sirius no matter which house he was in. I wonder if Slughorn did recruit him then... you know, since he couldn't have him in his house, he could at least have him in his club? Too bad we don't really get any indication one way or the other.