Snarry Severitus - an ultimate kink or canon within the fanon?
Snarry incest is a very rare scenario -I even wonder why it actually made into the_concept’s Snarodies, because there are very few such fics ever written.
People who write Severitus are usually squicked by slash, or at least wary of putting the so called gen-audience off. Thus, I understand that there could be no sex (even the regular, het, kind is frowned upon) in, say, Year Like None Other, In Blood Only, Resonance, or Blood Magic. On the other hand, people who write Snarry don’t bother with the paternity scenario, since, out of definition, there’s (?) no sex in it, and we want to see the boys going at it like rabbits, which is a tad unusual between a father and son. Yet, there is a considerable amount of people (myself included) who, when reading the Snape - Harry interactions in the above-mentioned gen stories can’t help thinking “OMG, so hot” every 2 pages or so. Someone said it’s simply because Snarry and Severitus are like chocolate and fudge combined, but I think there’s even more to it.
1. Some people like to see their ultimate taboos crossed - be it homosexuality, power abuse or incest. So what about you, people, thinking that Lucius Malfoy hitting on Draco is practically canon? Peace. Perhaps BDSM, slavery, prostitution or water sports fics are your cup of tea? Anything that knocks your socks off. Snarry Severitus is, in that respect, a teacher!Snape and student!Harry power abuse scenario taken to the extreme.
2. Furthermore, some people (that is me) consider it extremely IC for Snape and Harry to go for it, no qualms about the consequences. My personal Snape is a fucked-up-bastard!DeathEater!Snape (the In Blood Only Snape is very close to this ideal), so why should he bother with some social rules in the first place? And we all know how much Harry likes to consider rules to be beneath him.
3. Yet, above all, it is similarity between the romantic and paternity scenario that is the main factor in my deeming Snarry Severitus only natural. Or any late paternity scenario, for that matter. As a teenager, I was forever reading Lucy Maud Montgomery’s “Jane of Lantern Hill”, a story of a young girl, living with her despotic grandmother and downtrodden mother. The girl has a huge crush (IMO) on this brilliant journalist whose articles she’s secretly reading, and he of course turns out to be her estranged father, with whom she is supposed to spend her summer. And play house. Back then, I was not perverted enough to voice (as I do know) my disappointment when the father and mother, not Jane, finally made up. However, I distinctly remember thinking that at 15-16 she no longer needed a father. She needed a lover, I reckoned.
Now, Harry usually gets adopted or discovers Snape is his father in his (Harry’s, not Snape’s!) late teens. From that moment on, they have to struggle past initial enmity towards acceptance, understanding and, eventually, love. This takes them a few weeks or months -awfully fast, if you ask me. Normally people get to know and love their children/parents gradually, for their whole life. When we reach 15-16, we no longer pay attention to our parents; we take them for granted, we rebel against them, we see their flaws, we don’t think how much we love them - quite the opposite, actually.
And here we have our Harry, on the cusp of manhood (hormones!), suddenly getting to know Snape, spending quality time with him, fighting with him (but not really), realizing how much he admires and loves him and how similar they are. And Snape? He also has to undergo a crash course in being caring, attentive and loving to someone whom he despised before. Rings the bell? It’s your usual Snarry scenario.
Thus, I can easily imagine them both confusing paternal/filial affections with other affections. I restate my point - at that age our psyche is prepared to forge other relationships - those of romantic nature - because that’s when we start to meet our potential partners. Harry, to my mind, skipped the parent-child phase, and no longer needs it. He is past the stage of being someone’s son and Snape is woefully inadequate as a parent, but they feel SOMETHING for each other. So they acknowledge each other as a father and son, because it’s the easiest explanation of what they feel. I’m sure they feel more and need more than your regular father-son relationship, because, being shiny new and recent, it’s too intense a relationship.
Here is also where my Oedipus complex theory kicks in. (WARNING - ARMCHAIR FREUDISM AHEAD)
Why this scenario (Snape is my father -> I lust after him) works particularly well for me? I read it as a kind of late Oedipus complex on Harry’s part. You know, when a girl dreams of marrying her father, or a boy - of killing his father and eloping with mother. I even remember having such fantasies myself. I’m not sure how it works for gay people (and don’t even try telling me Harry’s not gay. Just don’t.), but it would be only logical they had some subconscious fantasies about the same-sex parent. I see Harry as slightly stunted in his emotional development, as he did not have any real parental figures in childhood, so perhaps he did not resolve his Oedipus complex when other people did (around the age of 5). It is only when actual father (Snape) is foisted upon him that Harry’s oedipal urges can take the better of him. Such a lately developed Oedipus complex has even more fodder than a regular one: a teenager has more avenues of expressing his frustration than a child has. Thus, it is only natural for a Severitus!Harry to be literally consumed with passion for his newly-acquired father, just as a 5 year old is.
They (and some readers) can deceive themselves that it’s purely platonic, but I know better;)
That is my reading of ALL the gen Severitus stories (and that is why people can always tell if I’m reading a Snarry or a Severitus: with the latter, I always have this knowing, supercilious smirk plastered on my face, and I’m prone to fits of writhing on the bed because of what I perceive as UST.)
4. The actual few Snarry incest stories (painless_j’s list) go like this:
Snape and Harry are shagging, they find out Snape’s Harry’s father, and they resume shagging. I can understand this - sexual attraction (love) against all odds.
However, it is not really what I consider an ideal Snarry Severitus, which is they find out first and shag later. Not in spite of, but BECAUSE of being a father and son.
Because they:
- know that having a “healthy” father and son relationship won’t solve their problems,
- know it’s too late and too surreal for being platonically affectionate,
- are turned on by their own perversion.
- are Snape and Harry and belong with each other, for God’s sake!
There is only one such story out there,nimori’s Fall Into Charybdis and it’s perfect beyond words, a Snarry incest dream come true.
Now, for the recent lack of these, I’m beginning to embrace a totally new fandom (new for me, that is) - the Jeeves & Wooster relationship, which is as innocent, charming and natural as they come. Perhaps they will have a better influence on me. PG Wodehoeuse's language is rubbing off on me already.
On a different note, what's with these richtext thingummies? They'd mixed all the links. I was forced to delete my entry and post it again, foregoing the richtext and squinting and straining to type html all by myself (*exhausted*) Is it the lj, being the usual rummy contraption it is, or is it yours truly?
People who write Severitus are usually squicked by slash, or at least wary of putting the so called gen-audience off. Thus, I understand that there could be no sex (even the regular, het, kind is frowned upon) in, say, Year Like None Other, In Blood Only, Resonance, or Blood Magic. On the other hand, people who write Snarry don’t bother with the paternity scenario, since, out of definition, there’s (?) no sex in it, and we want to see the boys going at it like rabbits, which is a tad unusual between a father and son. Yet, there is a considerable amount of people (myself included) who, when reading the Snape - Harry interactions in the above-mentioned gen stories can’t help thinking “OMG, so hot” every 2 pages or so. Someone said it’s simply because Snarry and Severitus are like chocolate and fudge combined, but I think there’s even more to it.
1. Some people like to see their ultimate taboos crossed - be it homosexuality, power abuse or incest. So what about you, people, thinking that Lucius Malfoy hitting on Draco is practically canon? Peace. Perhaps BDSM, slavery, prostitution or water sports fics are your cup of tea? Anything that knocks your socks off. Snarry Severitus is, in that respect, a teacher!Snape and student!Harry power abuse scenario taken to the extreme.
2. Furthermore, some people (that is me) consider it extremely IC for Snape and Harry to go for it, no qualms about the consequences. My personal Snape is a fucked-up-bastard!DeathEater!Snape (the In Blood Only Snape is very close to this ideal), so why should he bother with some social rules in the first place? And we all know how much Harry likes to consider rules to be beneath him.
3. Yet, above all, it is similarity between the romantic and paternity scenario that is the main factor in my deeming Snarry Severitus only natural. Or any late paternity scenario, for that matter. As a teenager, I was forever reading Lucy Maud Montgomery’s “Jane of Lantern Hill”, a story of a young girl, living with her despotic grandmother and downtrodden mother. The girl has a huge crush (IMO) on this brilliant journalist whose articles she’s secretly reading, and he of course turns out to be her estranged father, with whom she is supposed to spend her summer. And play house. Back then, I was not perverted enough to voice (as I do know) my disappointment when the father and mother, not Jane, finally made up. However, I distinctly remember thinking that at 15-16 she no longer needed a father. She needed a lover, I reckoned.
Now, Harry usually gets adopted or discovers Snape is his father in his (Harry’s, not Snape’s!) late teens. From that moment on, they have to struggle past initial enmity towards acceptance, understanding and, eventually, love. This takes them a few weeks or months -awfully fast, if you ask me. Normally people get to know and love their children/parents gradually, for their whole life. When we reach 15-16, we no longer pay attention to our parents; we take them for granted, we rebel against them, we see their flaws, we don’t think how much we love them - quite the opposite, actually.
And here we have our Harry, on the cusp of manhood (hormones!), suddenly getting to know Snape, spending quality time with him, fighting with him (but not really), realizing how much he admires and loves him and how similar they are. And Snape? He also has to undergo a crash course in being caring, attentive and loving to someone whom he despised before. Rings the bell? It’s your usual Snarry scenario.
Thus, I can easily imagine them both confusing paternal/filial affections with other affections. I restate my point - at that age our psyche is prepared to forge other relationships - those of romantic nature - because that’s when we start to meet our potential partners. Harry, to my mind, skipped the parent-child phase, and no longer needs it. He is past the stage of being someone’s son and Snape is woefully inadequate as a parent, but they feel SOMETHING for each other. So they acknowledge each other as a father and son, because it’s the easiest explanation of what they feel. I’m sure they feel more and need more than your regular father-son relationship, because, being shiny new and recent, it’s too intense a relationship.
Here is also where my Oedipus complex theory kicks in. (WARNING - ARMCHAIR FREUDISM AHEAD)
Why this scenario (Snape is my father -> I lust after him) works particularly well for me? I read it as a kind of late Oedipus complex on Harry’s part. You know, when a girl dreams of marrying her father, or a boy - of killing his father and eloping with mother. I even remember having such fantasies myself. I’m not sure how it works for gay people (and don’t even try telling me Harry’s not gay. Just don’t.), but it would be only logical they had some subconscious fantasies about the same-sex parent. I see Harry as slightly stunted in his emotional development, as he did not have any real parental figures in childhood, so perhaps he did not resolve his Oedipus complex when other people did (around the age of 5). It is only when actual father (Snape) is foisted upon him that Harry’s oedipal urges can take the better of him. Such a lately developed Oedipus complex has even more fodder than a regular one: a teenager has more avenues of expressing his frustration than a child has. Thus, it is only natural for a Severitus!Harry to be literally consumed with passion for his newly-acquired father, just as a 5 year old is.
They (and some readers) can deceive themselves that it’s purely platonic, but I know better;)
That is my reading of ALL the gen Severitus stories (and that is why people can always tell if I’m reading a Snarry or a Severitus: with the latter, I always have this knowing, supercilious smirk plastered on my face, and I’m prone to fits of writhing on the bed because of what I perceive as UST.)
4. The actual few Snarry incest stories (painless_j’s list) go like this:
Snape and Harry are shagging, they find out Snape’s Harry’s father, and they resume shagging. I can understand this - sexual attraction (love) against all odds.
However, it is not really what I consider an ideal Snarry Severitus, which is they find out first and shag later. Not in spite of, but BECAUSE of being a father and son.
Because they:
- know that having a “healthy” father and son relationship won’t solve their problems,
- know it’s too late and too surreal for being platonically affectionate,
- are turned on by their own perversion.
- are Snape and Harry and belong with each other, for God’s sake!
There is only one such story out there,nimori’s Fall Into Charybdis and it’s perfect beyond words, a Snarry incest dream come true.
Now, for the recent lack of these, I’m beginning to embrace a totally new fandom (new for me, that is) - the Jeeves & Wooster relationship, which is as innocent, charming and natural as they come. Perhaps they will have a better influence on me. PG Wodehoeuse's language is rubbing off on me already.
On a different note, what's with these richtext thingummies? They'd mixed all the links. I was forced to delete my entry and post it again, foregoing the richtext and squinting and straining to type html all by myself (*exhausted*) Is it the lj, being the usual rummy contraption it is, or is it yours truly?