Essays on John Nettleship (inspiration for Severus as a character)
Not sure what are the rules upon analysis focused on not Severus directly, but rather the inspiration for him — albeit I thought this category would be closest due to obvious close ties with Snape in general as a topic (and in this case, origins, differences and parallels between him and JKR’s ex chemistry teacher).
I recently found out a lot of content provided by someone who got to known to John Nettleship while he was still alive (sadly passed from cancer at age 71 in 2011) and decided to share how she remembered him by along with his opinions and reactions to HP/Severus’ fandom growing as well as the existence of the character itself.
The person, namely is Claire M Jordan, going online by Whitehound. Besides the mentioned below essays, she has written plenty of Fanfiction including Snape and other HP characters, albeit as she admitted herself, she gave up on writing and collecting fan art (which she used t0 show to John) as frequently after John’s death. She’s made some quite fruitful and extensive analysis (and other forms of fan work, including the mildly crossing with her own career as a biologist even) of Severus as a character too but I’ll likely put them to share in a separate post sometime and leave this one as more so a spotlight on John Nettleship himself.
I think it’s pretty fascinating and I wouldn’t have thought myself of many things said memorial mentioned, but some surprises aside I find it also interesting how some aspects of John’s character and things he endured in the past (which was very saddening to find out) was something that also been assembled into the backstory of Snape’s — even if it’s pretty obvious Rowling couldn’t have an idea of that at the time and it was more of a coincidence. Makes one think of how such details can ”stain” one’s personality even in subconscious ways that do not have to be spoken to still be assumable. On more personal accord, too — I had always headcanonned Snape as neurodivergent in one shape or another (and, due to Rowling’s interpretation of John’s behavior likely the way it shows for both of them still have their differences, or at least Snape coming to mask much better on social areas), and it was definitely one of a curiosity to find out that John, indeed was too (very likely in the form of Asperger’s) and explanation of that part as well as Whitehound’s attitude against the public opinion bashing it as something “too private/embarrassing” found its place, which felt very progressive for the times it was published in, despite some smaller misconceptions here and there due to the research on the matter being obviously lesser at the time (namely the big dissonance between Asperger’s and ASD that is way less obvious of a thing in fact of which diagnosis nowadays doesn’t come down to as stiff black-white frame between the two).
A lot of points brought up in this essay, to my impression give a lot of food for thought — especially on understanding Snape’s ways as a teacher and the ways inspiration influenced what we now recognize as the character he turned out to be, even touching the much heavily thought upon in the fandom topic of Snape’s appearance (taking the route of something even I deeply appreciate, that is, headcanons about genetical ties to what Snape’s complexion resulted in and which I might take a closer look on myself in a meta I planned about possible Snape’s roots). A lot of things brought up as a side information (like for instance, historical, biological or geographical facts) too was also just interestingly mingling together with the core points about John and Snape themselves, and John’s own relationship with such an alter ego existing in the first place evolving thorough the years.
I were oddly amused and piqued also by the idea of him being willing to also do his own fanfic about Snape x OC pairing, albeit unfortunately his health stopping him from doing so (still doesn’t stop me from wondering how it must’ve turn out if came true, perhaps heavy inspiration on the OC coming from his wife Shirley though?).
Anyway, this esssay (and other ones) can be found there:
A true original: John Nettleship and the Roots of Severus Snape
A memorial essay for lovely John, scholar and fan, JK Rowling's Chemistry teacher and literary model, who said that Snape would be his Horcrux. With appendices:
— Caerwent, Camelot and the magical coming-and-going lake:
a detailed look at John's historical research and the curious history of his home village of Caerwent, once one of the last strongholds of Rome in Britain.
background information, lyrics and music for this loved but almost lost children's song which John used to perform to amuse his students.
— The singing of John Nettleship:
songs by John and by Phyllis Lewis, who was the visual model for Pomona Sprout.
— Also, on a side note I’ll add a piece of silly fan-made fantastic beast (shared by Claire despite not being written by her) which John created inspired by the Fantastic Beasts and Where to find them: The Scalpipede
Currently, it’s also pretty much unknown what is Claire up to nowadays. I’m not sure if anything about her current works is known or whether she even is still present over the internet, however the latest publishings of hers were dated up to 2015. It’s known however, that she had known John personally for around 4 years (2007-2011). Besides her more quiet contribution to articles about Nettleship and her own site, I had only seen other mentions under the same nickname on her Fanfiction net profile. She’s been implied to be in somewhat close to John’s age so hopefully, it’s not a matter of passing as much as another withdrawal from creativity she mentioned to happen in the past for periods as long as 20 years.
