How do the characters of Arthur and Sheila Birlng change during the course of the play 'An Inspector Calls?'

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How do the characters of Arthur and Sheila Birlng change during the course of the play 'An Inspector Calls?'

In this essay I will discuss how the characters of Arthur and Sheila Birling change during the course of the play 'An Inspector Calls'. This essay will explore the characters Arthur and Sheila Birling in depth looking at their development through the play. The essay will also describe how Arthur and Sheila Birling change from the beginning of the play to the end.

The play 'An Inspector Calls' was set in 1912 but written in 1945 by JB Priestly. He uses the time difference effectively to give an overly confident and slightly stupid look to the Mr Birling in his views on the future. JB Priestly uses dramatic irony to show this with Birling's comments on: WW1, Mr Birling says "The Germans don't want war" but we all know that WW1 started two years later in 1914 and ended in 1918 with the Germans losing. Mr Birling thought the Titanic was "absolutely unsinkable", but it wasn't, it hit an iceberg and sank in the north pacific in April 1912. There were many strikes in 1925 and then a general strike in 1926, Mr Birling says "there's a lot of wild talk about possible labour trouble in the near future" making him look smart as he said it in 1912. He also says that "we're in for a time of ever increasing prosperity" and Wall Street crashed in 1929, leading to the 1930s being called the great depression because lots of people had no money or work. This time difference makes the Audience more knowledgeable than the characters and makes the audience think that the characters are stupid in the things they say and do.

Priestly believed in an equal political system (a socialist), but the theatre director Stephen Daldry thought he was "a radical". JB Priestley's son Tom thought that his father was "trying to ensure that the life after the war had been better than before. He was echoing the feelings of ordinary people that there was generally a need for a change". In a radio broadcast Priestly said that after and during the war people had a sense of community and purpose, which was doing well for others as well for themselves. Too many people only think about themselves and what is best for them. So he wrote about what happens to people who are selfish and what they can cause.
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"Arthur Birling is a heavy-looking, rather portentous man in his middle fifties with fairly easy manners but rather provincial in his speech". He is also a well-dressed smart man, and likes to keep up his good appearance. At dinner with the family the men are in "tails and white ties". He uses pompous language and is full of self importance. He feels that what he has to say is more important than what anybody else has to say, like when he interrupts Eric "just let me finish". He doesn't stop to think that what Eric has to say ...

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