Examine the way Inspector Goole is presented in "An Inspector Calls". What is his role in the play?

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Simon Westwood

“He never seemed like an ordinary Police

Inspector.”

Examine the way Inspector Goole is presented in

“An Inspector Calls”.  What is his role in the play?

“An Inspector Calls”, by J.B. Priestley, is not an average murder mystery.  In a normal murder mystery there are three things: someone is really dead; someone is really a murderer and the police inspector is genuine.  In “An Inspector Calls” none of these is certain.  The play does however work as a murder mystery because it keeps us guessing right till the end.

The inspector in “An Inspector Calls” operates unlike an ordinary police inspector.  His unusual methods lead Birling and Gerald to believing that he is nothing but a clever hoaxer: “Now he has to work a trick on us.”  There is some truth in what Birling says, in that once the inspector has shocked them, they will do whatever he says and believe whatever he says.  Now, the inspector has dominance over the other characters.  The inspector constantly repeats details about the girl’s death to distress the other characters:

“This afternoon a young woman drank some disinfectant,

and died, after several hours of agony, tonight in the infirmary.”

“Yes, she was in great agony.  They did everything they could

for her at the infirmary, but she died.  Suicide, of course.”

“Two hours ago a young woman died in the infirmary.

She’d been taken there because she’d swallowed a lot

of strong disinfectant.  Burnt her inside out, of course.”

The characters react to the inspectors ‘shock tactics’ how would have wished them to.  Once they are shocked, they will answer almost anything that the inspector asks them.

I don’t agree with Gerald’s statement that,

“Very artfully, working on bits of information he’s picked

up here and there, he buffs us into confessing that we’ve all been

mixed up in this girl’s life in one way or another.”

I think that he knows just how much that each character has been involved with the dead girl, like Sheila says:

“Why – you fool- he knows.  Of course he knows.  

And I hate to think just how much he knows that we don’t know yet.”

The only thing that I feel the inspector doesn’t already know is if they will learn from their mistakes and take responsibility for others.  I think the only thing that he picks up from his questioning is who will actually change their ways and outlook on life.

The inspector in “An Inspector Calls” often sounds and operates unlike an ordinary police inspector.  Instead of just being interested in facts, he often sounds like a judge.  He involves himself with people’s personal terms as well as working with the facts.  He judges his suspects.  He says to Birling:

“It’s better to ask for the Earth than to take it.”

He is trying to make Birling feel guilty, because he is stating that all the girl did was ask for higher wages, when he just takes his vast wealth for granted.  He uses the same methods with each of the characters.  To Mrs Birling he says:

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“I think you have done something terribly wrong –

and that you’re going to spend the rest of your life regretting it.”

By saying this he is trying to make Mrs Birling feel really bad, and make her regret her actions.  The inspector has to be harder with Mr and Mrs Birling because they will not willingly admit responsibility and change their views.  He says to Sheila:

“You’re partly to blame.  Just as your father is.”

The inspector is basically making sure that Sheila knows she is partly to blame, and make her feel guilty. ...

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