One thing that always disturbed me about Snape’s death is its inevitability. Not just in the general pathos of his character, but his actual physical death. We can say “well, if Bellatrix hadn’t aimed at Remus then he wouldn’t have died.” Or “if Sirius hadn’t gone to the Department of Mysteries he would be alive”.
With Snape that’s not possible. A lot has to happen for him to survive. Voldemort was always going to come for him. There was little Snape could do to avoid it. For him to survive, someone would have to help him, for instance, which was difficult considering that no one knew the truth about him yet, and would only know after Harry shouted it to Voldemort in the Final Battle. That person would need supplies to help him and they had very little time, considering that it was a throat wound that made him bleed to death in minutes.
And yet…there is something that always struck me as odd about his death. The lack of fighting. After Nagini strikes, Snape just falls down, and tries with his hand to stop the bleeding. We know he had his wand. He’s grasping it when talking to Voldemort. We know Snape knew - maybe even invented - a counter-curse that healed the effects of a curse which caused serious wounds and a lot of blood. Throughout the series, Snape helps healing people who suffer from Dark Magic’s curses: Katie, Dumbledore, the petrified students. We know that Nagini’s venom keeps the wounds open, but we also know there was an antidote: it was made in St. Mungo’s when Arthur Weasley was bitten. We know there are potions that replenish the blood, that bandages could temporarily stanch Arthur’s bleeding, and we know Snape was well attuned to the benefits of Bezoars and dittany, articles easily found in a potion’s storeroom. We know the accio spell could summon some of these things, maybe enough to allow him to survive for a few more hours. After all, both Arthur and Harry survive being bitten by Nagini. Although Snape’s wounds are far graver it is also true he is a more powerful wizard than Arthur and is at least as resourceful as Harry and Hermione.
It is, therefore, not unreasonable to assume that Snape was capable and powerful enough to buy himself a few extra time. But the fact remains that Snape doesn’t even try to use magic to heal himself from a physical wound. And once Harry shows up in front of him he completely stops trying to stanch the bleeding with his hand, chosing instead to grasp Harry’s robes.
I don’t want to go as far as saying that Snape wanted to die – at least not until he saw Harry in front of him and gave his memories – but that he crucially didn’t mind dying. This is perhaps confirmed by how Harry describes his eyes in the chapter “Sacking of Severus Snape”: “his black eyes had a dead, cold look”. Dead look is not an expression JKR uses often to describe her characters. It happens again when Snape realizes Voldemort is going to kill him: “Snape’s face was like a death mask. It was marble white and so still that when he spoke, it was a shock to see that anyone lived behind the blank eyes.”
This is dark and very deliberate in how it evokes depression and despondency. It does far more than foreshadowing Snape’s death; it illustrates his state of mind. Snape wasn’t just going to die. He was already dead. He had no life in him. No will to live. His only motivation at this point was Harry’s success - and there’s no doubt that he would continue to do whatever it took to ensure it - but even that couldn’t summon up enough life in him. His mission gave him purpose, but it didn’t give him life. It didn’t keep his eyes and face from a permanent state of blankness and emptiness.
It is obvious that Snape’s slower death allowed him to pass his memories on to Harry. However, an experienced writer, which JKR was at that point, could have easily found another device for a character to transmit information to another. In a world where the most common way to kill is through a Curse that instantly and inevitably finishes people off, the physicality and the slowness of Snape’s death gives him an agency and control that he purposefully relinquishes.
This is perhaps why his death always had such a huge emotional impact. Because Snape could potentially have survived had he truly wanted – unlike Remus and Sirius who couldn’t escape the immediacy of Avada Kedavra – but he didn’t find enough will in himself to fight death. Now whether he wanted to die, or he was relieved by it, or was simply tired, is up to interpretation. But it is immensely tragic. And it is meant to be. It leads the reader to the almost inevitable and terrible conclusion that dying really was Snape’s happy ending because it was what came closer to relieve him of his obvious suffering.
