Classism in "An Inspector Calls"

Although the author’s intention is to entertain the audience just like every play would, however he also isn’t just entertaining the audience because his intention shows that he is more interested in showing the audience about the structure of the class system. The play is set at the turn of the century and is centered on a wealthy family who are successful and prosperous at a time of poverty for many. They are oblivious to this, and given the fact that the play was

written many years later the play contains much irony about the future, but not only does it make it question our history but also our

future. An Inspector Calls is one of J.B Priestley’s plays which have many messages that are social and political, also this play has a similarity with Priestley’s other plays because he plays with the concept of time. He believed in socialism quite a lot and felt very strongly about it, and he got his point about Socialism through by his plays. This play was written at a time that Britain was ruled by a Labor government and many socialist policies were seen as the way to go ahead in life. As a result of this at that time it was a popular way of thinking, so it may be said that perhaps J.B Priestley intention whilst writing this play was to teach the people who weren’t so convinced with this way of thinking and that were slightly backward.

The inspector is portrayed as being the champion of socialism; he is there to symbolize Priestley’s views. Essentially Priestley uses biased representations of capitalism, and socialism, reflected with Birling, and inspector Goole, to prepare the reader for his conclusive message. Priestley conveys this message of responsibility towards others in many ways throughout the play. He also critici...

... middle of paper ...

...raise the curtain and unveil the truth in the story, another way the producer did this was through Sheila’s dress unravelling. Along with this towards the end this fact was shown by the soldier who fought for the safety of others and was altruistic because he had no obvious payment for risking his life, by him putting blankets on the Birling. The producer did this to show the equality between the others and the Birlings. It could be argued that by doing this the author and producer were destroying the concept of the class system. After the soldiers put on the blankets Mr and Mrs Birling were facing to the back of the stage because they were refusing to move on in time whereas Sheila and Eric were facing towards the audience which was to the front this symbolised that they were ready to move on into the future and this shows that time didn’t destroy Sheila and Eric.