Two Up, Two Down

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…

It makes me kind of sad how there's this great camaraderie among all the members of the Order except for Snape. He's always on the outside. And yes that's partly self-created by some of his behavior. But it's still sad.

He risks his life in one of the most dangerous assignments, brings his reports and then leaves; everyone else sits down happily to dinner together and he goes home to eat alone at Spinner's End.

And all anyone can think of is how glad they are he doesn't stay for dinner. His whole life the dynamic has always been that he is disliked and excluded. And to some extent sometimes, because he expects that treatment, he creates the conditions for it. It's quite tragic.

“Of course, it became apparent to me very quickly that he had no extraordinary talent at all. He has fought his way out of a number of tight corners by a simple combination of sheer luck and more talented friends. He is mediocre to the last degree, though as obnoxious and self-satisfied as was his father before him.

he’s sneak-complimenting hermione

What do Snape haters take away from Snape's story? When they finish the last page of Deathly Hallows and close the book, what do they think the point of Snape was in the whole series? Is the time spent reading about him just a total waste to them?

Genuinely curious...

Eileen Prince is very interesting to me, I wish we knew more about her and her relationship with Severus, but also her past. I would like to think they had a good relationship but realistically it was most likely strained because of the abuse she/both of them faced at home, she was probably for the most part emotionally absent. And maybe in a way there's a parallel between her and Severus. What if she resented her son because she couldn't help but see her abuser in him (and she hated herself for feeling this way)? The same way Severus would later feel about Harry? What if he inherited his mother's anger

“’Never mind that! How did Snape punish Ginny, Neville, and Luna?’ asked Harry urgently.

‘Professor Snape sent them into the Forbidden Forest, to do some work for the oaf, Hagrid.’

‘Hagrid’s not an oaf!’ Hermione said shrilly.

‘And Snape might’ve thought that was a punishment,’ said Harry, ‘but Ginny, Neville, and Luna probably had a good laugh with Hagrid. The Forbidden Forest… they’ve faced plenty worse than the Forbidden Forest, big deal!’” -Deathly Hallows

So I do think it’s important that the Carrows are “in charge of all discipline” but Snape is the one to punish NG&L - presumably, as the war goes on, Snape’s control and status in Hogwarts is on the decline, or he knows that he can’t intervene all the time without being noticed by Voldemort. But the teachers “are supposed to refer us to the Carrows if we do anything wrong” and yet Snape takes the initiative here. And it’s also worth noticing that when Neville talks about the situation at Hogwarts - the torturing, the brainwashing - he never once mentions Snape. It’s the Carrows who are in charge of all that shit and if Snape doesn’t stop them… well, can he? Really? There’s a reason none of the other teachers rebel either and it’s because they know they can’t. Not without risking the lives of all the students (as well as their own). Snape is as aware of this as McGonagall - probably more so. 

But! Snape does what he can. What always confused me is how Harry, who is far from stupid, is so blinded by his hatred for Snape that he forgets how clever Snape is. Harry, do you really think Snape doesn’t know Hagrid won’t really “punish” NG&L? Do you think Snape’s worked with Hagrid for years and isn’t aware that he has a soft heart and is terrible at disciplining anyone, let alone people he likes? Snape sent them to Hagrid because he knows the Carrows don’t know that. In one swoop, he’s able to make it seem like he’s punishing these three while keeping them out of harms way and with someone he knows would never hurt them. 

What gets me, time and time again, is that Snape does this for Neville, the student everyone in fandom thinks he hates. I doubt Snape likes Neville, but he hardly wants to see Neville tortured - he wanted to, all he would have had to do is refer him to the Carrows for punishment instead of Hagrid. But he doesn’t. Because even he doesn’t like the students, even if they all hate him, he wants them to be safe. There isn’t anything that says liking always equals protecting and disliking always equals not caring about their safety. If anything, we see this abundantly with Snape and Harry, but we also see it when Snape’s headmaster. Which is why I’m always really, really vexed when McGonagall and Flitwick drive Snape away and yell coward at him in “The Sacking of Severus Snape.” It bothers me that McGonagall, at least, wouldn’t have been suspicious about Snape doing favors for Gryffindors (ESPECIALLY Neville) by getting them “easy” detentions. And we have no real evidence that Snape participated in the tortures or the brainwashing - only that he allowed it to happen, again, because it wasn’t like he had any real choice otherwise - not while he had to protect the position Dumbledore died to help him keep and finish the war. 

I mean, I get the ‘Snape bullies children!’ argument. I do. He hardly treats them nicely. But I think that this, and the consistent, dogged way he looks after Harry are constantly overlooked and undermined. I’m not saying that what Snape does for the students negates his past behavior, but it bothers me when we only pay attention to the negative things he’s done and ignore the positive ones.