Priestley desires his audience to believe that Mr Birling is the most responsible for the death of Eva/Daisy's death as Mr. Birling is an austere man who ignores the needs of others to keep up profits and a good reputation. Birling perceives other people as "cheap labor." Mr Birling, a wealthy capitalist man, and a "rather portentous man," is an ignorant, over-confident, arrogant man who finds it difficult to think about other people. He doesn’t believe in "community and all that nonsense". Birling has a narrow perspective of the world and says that "a man has to make us own way". After Eva had lost her job, he expected her to fend for herself, which was an unfair judgement. Birling dismisses the idea of social responsibility and he calls people like the Inspector "cranks". Birling didn’t care about his workers and proudly says "I have a couple hundred workers under me, who keep changing," which further iterates the idea of him being arrogant and boastful. Instead of improving things for the workers who went on strike, he ensured that he …show more content…
and Mrs. Birling, feel ashamed and guilty of their actions and realise that their actions were unaccounted for. However Mr. Birling, being a selfish and self-centred man, feels no remorse or regret for his deed. In a nonchalant manner, he passes off the Inspector's visit as a "hoax" and regards it all as a joke instead of facing up to what he's done. Birling is shown to be someone who cares more about his reputation than anything else. Instead of helping his wife's situation, he thinks more about how "the Press might easily take it up-". He also hopes to hide the fact that Eric stole money: "I’ve got to cover this up as soon as I can." Birling wants to preserve his reputation and is paranoid about losing his titles as he fears that "there’ll be a public scandal". Birling doesn’t take responsibility for his wrongdoings and cares more about how he "was almost certain for a
Priestley mainly uses the characters in the play to present his views, especially Mr and Mrs Birling, to present his ideas about class and society. In the Birling family, Mrs Birling is the most upper class, and is always referring to the lower class female factory workers such as Eva Smith as ‘girls of that class’. She seems to think that working class people are not humans at all.
Arthur Birling is glad because Gerald is the son of his business competitor and it will be a merger of businesses. Through the middle of the dinner there is a knock at the door. This is where we meet inspector Goole.
Since Priestley to show the current stereotypical mindset of people during those days, he uses Mrs. Birling to show her old-fashioned thoughts, as when Sheila doesn't believe that Gerald was busy all summer, Mrs. Birling says how "men with important work to do sometimes have to do sometimes have to spend nearly all their time and energy on business." Priestley also stereotypes men as he describes Gerald as a hero as he felt as though it was his duty to rescue Eva/Daisy from Alderman
The whole family’s actions are the cause of Eva’s death however the message about responsibility the Inspector presents is only take on board by Eric and Sheila. In conclusion, Priestley clearly gets across his message of responsibility towards others in the play. A clever script cunningly executed points out Priestley’s views to the audience. ‘Responsibility’ is the focal point of the play and is consistently addressed at the end of each interrogation, but the Birlings fail to recognise this.
The Inspector, straight form his introduction, is commanding and authoritative. Upon his entrance he creates, “…at once an impression of massiveness, solidity and purposefulness.”(PG.11) The Inspector continues to create this impression as he progresses through his speeches and through his interrogation of the family. The Inspector remains confident, sturdy and composed, while people around him crumble and fall to pieces. His ‘solidity’ is proven by the fact he remains on task despite numerous attempts from Birling to digress from the points he is making. The Inspector is told to appear ‘purposeful’; this is shown where he explains to Birling that Birlings way of thinking “Every man must only look out for himself,” is not the case, and all warps of society are interlinked. The view is best illustrated in the Inspectors final speech, where he says, “We don't live alone. We are members of one body. We are responsible for each other.”(p.56). This idea is one that Priestley, himself believed in deeply, and many of Priestleys writing shared this very theme.
This helped Priestley promote socialism against capitalism. JB Priestley uses dramatic devices to make An inspector calls a modern day morality play, to do this he uses dramatic devices, such as dramatic irony and tension in order to convey the message through the entire play. They are used accurately considering the time in which the play is set. Priestley also uses the characters as dramatic devices, they symbolise the dramatic devices, an example of this is Priestley makes us hate Mr. Birling because he symbolises capitalism, and in Priestley’s eyes capitalism is wrong. Throughout the play, Mr. Birling is the voice of capitalism....
Through his play Priestley endeavoured to convey a message to the audiences, that we could not go on being self obsessed and that we had to change our political views. He used the Birling family as an example of the Capitalist family that was common amongst the higher classes in 1912, who took no responsibility for other people and he showed this with the power of Socialism, represented by the inspector; the uneasy facade put on by the Birling family to cover up their real flaws and how they have treated those whom they considered to be lower class could not stand up to any scrutiny without shame for what had happened, showing that they know they have been wrong.
The story line of ‘An Inspector Calls’ holds a substantial amount of importance that addresses so many of humanities problems such as morals, prejudism, sexism, inequality between families, wealth and general class, and also taking responsibility, all of which are depicted through each of the characters, linking them in some way with Eva’s death, they are all in some respect responsible for it; this is the main theme that Priestly tries to portray using the Inspector as his mouthpiece. JB Priestly was a strong political
J.B. Priestley also indicates a lot of tension. When the inspector comes in and Mr.Birling asks the inspector, “well, what is it then?” and then the inspector starts to introduce the case about Eva Smith’s death and as each member of the family is found to have played a part in Eva's death. the inspector used new pieces of information contribute to the story being constructed. He grasps the audience’s attention in how each character one after another reacts to the
‘An Inspector Calls’ was written by J.B. Priestley in 1945, but is set specifically in 1912. The Birlings, an upper-middle class family, are celebrating their daughter’s engagement to a business-rival’s son. Into this scene of celebration comes the Inspector, who is there to investigate the suicide of a young working class woman. In this essay I intend to examine the role of the Inspector in the play, looking at his main functions and how effective he is in his role.
Priestley’s socialistic belief that ‘we are responsible for each other’ is a significant theme throughout the play An Inspector Calls. Priestly demonstrates the difference between those who have accepted their responsibility and those who have not by doing this he outlines the problems with the idea that people should only care about themselves. The play explores the socialist idea that ‘We are responsible for each other’ and that an individualistic, materialistic, capitalist society is not the way forward.
At this point everyone is in a happy mood, however their mood soon changes when the inspector arrives, the play shows Mr Birling as an inpatient powerful businessman, the play also shows that Mr Birling is a really proud man he is proud of himself and what he has accomplished. Almost the first thing Mr birling says to the inspector is “I was a alderman for years-and lord mayor two years ago-and I’m still on the bench-so I think I know Bromley police officers pretty well.” Mr Birling is trying to emphasise his status and how important he is to the inspector. His first intention is to make a good impression rather than finding out why the inspector has called; when Mr Birling does ask why the inspector has called Mr Birling soon becomes impatient when the inspector does not fully answer the question. This shows that Mr Birling is an impatient man and it also shows that Mr Birling thinks he is...
Sheila Birling is another character in ?An Inspector Calls? who also points this out during the play, ?You fool- he knows. Of course he knows. And I hate to think how much he knows that we don?t know yet. You?ll see. You?ll see.?
On overall, Priestley has presented the two characters, Arthur and Sheila Birling as completely differently. He wanted to match the story to the historical context of the 1910’s, but he has done this differently with Sheila. This is because the play was written in 1946 and the world had two wars and has started to comprehend the strength of community. She is the young generation of the 1910’s this means in a few years down the line, a war is going to break out and if they keep making the same mistake over and over again, it’s not going to turn out any better, by this, we see what happens in the second world war. This is why Sheila has been presented so that she understands consequences of what might happen if we don’t pull ourselves together.
As I lay there in the pool floating along with the floating device watching the