Even the “arrogant” Birling recognises this after the “interrogation”.
He even acknowledges that the inspector has socialist tendencies “prejudice…. socialist…. you let him bluff.” Birling is being hypocritical. In this very sentence Birling is being narrow minded, the way he dislikes the inspector due to his socialist beliefs.
Priestley chooses to set his play in 1912, before the Titanic sank and before both of the world wars. He creates dramatic irony through many of Birlings speeches. Birling say’s “why a friend of mine went over this new liner last week - The Titanic – she sails next week – forty six thousand eight hundred tons – New York in 5 days – and every luxury – and unsinkable, absolutely unsinkable.” This is dramatic irony because we know now that The Titanic sank on Monday, 15th April 1912 but because the play is before that the characters don’t know that.
In the same speech Birling talks about the war he say’s “That’s what you’ve got to keep your eye on, facts like that, progress like that – and not a few German officers talking nonsense. Now you 3 young people just remember what I’m telling you now. Let’s say in 1940 – you might be giving a little party like this – your son or daughter might be getting engaged – and I tell you, by that time you’ll be living in a world that’ll forgotten all these capital versus labour agitations and all these silly little war scares. There’ll be peace and prosperity and rapid progress everywhere”
First he says that the German officers are bluffing and that there is nothing to worry about, they are making a fuss over nothing. He was wrong because 2 years later WW1 broke out. When he talks about the future around 1940 when Eric and Gerald are older and celebrating there son or daughters engagement, and that there will be peace and prosperity, well again this is dramatic irony because in 1939n WW2 broke out and I don’t think it was full of peace and prosperity.
The inspector is a dramatic device. He affects the dramatic structure of the play because the story is told through the inspectors’ investigation. It’s in the investigation that the characters are introduced properly and the investigation in it’s self is the story and unless he goes in order of who got involved with Eva s’ life than it wouldn’t make sense. They make it more dramatic by telling it through the investigation instead of having a narrator.
He has an affect on all the characters, but especially Sheila. We know this because at the beginning of the play she is like most of them she wants to know what this girl’s death has got to do with her family but because she doesn’t know who the inspector is talking about she feels she isn’t involved, and not responsible for this girl’s death. But after she has been questioned her attitude changes completely the opposite she feels as though it was her fault entirely because she was the one who got Eva sacked from her second job at Milwards, which the inspector described as her biggest down. When the inspector has left the family talking about the events that have happened, Birling however still feels the same as he did at the beginning Sheila doesn’t like this as you can see. “So nothing really happened. So there’s been nothing to be sorry for, nothing to learn, we can all go on behaving just as we did.” Sheila wants to change probably to relieve some of the guilt off her shoulders. Either she has taken in what’s happened and trying to change the way she treats people or she is trying to shift some of the guilt onto the rest of her family so she doesn’t feel so bad.
Through out the whole story the audience have watched the characters development especially Sheila from feeling completely innocent to blaming herself for Eva s death and taking 100% of the guilt and responsibility.
The inspector does not tell us everything himself. He makes the characters reveal their guilt. The inspector refuses to acknowledge the fact that the Birling family is an upper class knowing that he is more of a threat to them then they are to him. He hovers over the characters acting much like there conscience. He is described as creating “an impression of massiveness, solidity and purposefulness.”
He speaks carefully and has a disconcerting habit of looking hard at the person he addresses, forcing the truth out of each character in question. While Birling is moved to anger by the inspector he is not affected by being confronted with the effects of his actions until the inspector is about to leave. Sheila however is moved to tears of shock and guilt, the inspector has been successful inn making her see the consequences of her actions.
When the inspector was interrogating Eric the inspector tells Eric that Eva went to his mothers committee for help but Mrs Birling refused to help her Eric say “Then – you killed her. She came to you to protect me – and you turned her away – yes, and you killed her – and the child she’d have had too – my child – your own grandchild – you killed them both – damn you, damn you.” The inspector has got them turning on each other and eventually they come out with what actually happened.
Priestley uses the inspector to create moments of suspense and tension in the play. When the inspector starts questioning a new character he shows them a picture of who we assume is Eva Smith but he only shows the picture to the person he is questioning which means he could be showing a different picture each time but none of the charters know this, they just assume it’s the same picture. When the inspector has left, Gerald returns saying he’s been down to the police station and they don’t have anyone on there staff called Inspector Goole. Gerald reckons that the inspector was just a person having a laugh; he points out to them that he only showed one person a picture at a time and that he didn’t really accuse them or makes any accusations. “No, there isn’t. Look at it. A man comes here pretending to be a police officer. It’s a hoax of some kind. Now what does he do? Very artfully, working on bits of information he’s picked up here and there, he bluffs us into confessing that we’ve all been mixed up in this girl’s life in one way or another.” “And so we have.” “But how do you know it’s the same girl? After Birling has called the police station to confirm it he makes out that he knew all the time. “I was going to do this anyhow. I’ve had my suspicions all along.” This confirms to Birling that inspector Goole wasn’t a real inspector and never has been. Just after Birling has confirmed it Mrs Birling than says that she had guessed he wasn’t a real inspector. “I felt it all the time. He never talked liked one. He never even looked like one.” This leaves us wondering what is going on because now we know that there is no inspector Goole so was there a Eva Smith was there a death was it all a complete lie?
The ending symbolises the fact that you do not learn your lesson the first time, you will be taught it again and again. It symbolises that you can’t run from your conscience, as the Birlings find out. Priestley uses the dramatic twist of the inspector returning at the end of the play to emphasis this point, and makes it more effective by placing it just as the characters are beginning to relax. It serves to prick the conscience of both the characters and the audience. At the end of reading the play, I was left feeling as if I would like to think I had learned from the example of the Birlings and the message it contained. As it is a play though, I would have liked to see it acted out. The ending is well crafted, leaving an open ending to add to the dramatic effect, but looking at it differently, there is not really another way to have ended the play after that plot twist other than an open ending where it was without ruining the play itself. I think the majority of people who have seen this play would have liked to think of themselves as an Eric or Sheila.
J.B.Priestley’s inspector is central to the play. This is because Priestley’s aims are made clear by the inspector largely. As his interactions with the characters go, inspector Goole is mysterious. He has a way of making the characters confess to him, and to themselves, there role in Eva Smiths demise. He links the separate accounts together to form an approximate biography of Eva Smith from when she left the employment of Mr Birling up until she commits suicide. Inspector Goole has another use though – he acts as a social conscience of sorts. He acts as the voice of Priestley in the play, or the voice of Priestley’s socialist views. “We don’t live alone. We are members of one body. We are responsible for each other.” He points out that “we have to share something. If nothing else, we’ll have to share our guilt, and that “Public men Mr Birling, have responsibilities as well as privileges” to which Arthur Birling replies “you weren’t asked here to talk to me about my responsibilities.” Contrary to what Arthur Birling believes, it is a very likely that the inspector was sent to the Birlings to teach them about responsibilities.