Even after learning that he had been the first step in Eva’s downwards spiral, Birling still refuses to accept any blame and states that “if they didn’t like the usual rates, they could go and work somewhere else.” He feels that since he is in a higher position and has authority, he can do as he wishes, and if that means firing workers as he pleases, then he is “quite justified” in doing so. As opposed to Eva, he has complete control over his destiny. Looking at Eric’s speech, Mr Birling has no intention of ever agreeing with his son when he says, “it’s what we all did to her that matters.”
“She’d had a lot to say – far too much – so she had to go.”
- Mr. Arthur Birling
Having been brought up in a very upper-middle class background, Sheila Birling is a spoilt girl and is used to getting her own way, whatever the situation. She is known for having “a nasty temper sometimes” and is to a certain extent, a somewhat envious individual. As a typical girl of her stature, Sheila spends her days shopping or relaxing, normally in the company of her mother. She was the second step in Eva’s downwards spiral.
After two months of unemployment, Eva had been hired by Milwards, a well-known high-class shop. “She enjoyed being among pretty clothes,” and was getting along well. Sheila’s involvement with Eva came in on an average day in Milwards. She had been in one of her tempers, and was in the shop with her mother searching for a dress. Finding one she liked, Sheila was told the dress would not look good on her, and not believing either her mother, or the assistant, she had tried it on anyway. Discovering that they were in fact right, she realised that “she looked silly in it.” but got even more displeasured and irritated when she saw Eva holding the dress up as if she were wearing it, as she was “the right type for it.” Eva was described by Sheila as “a very pretty girl with big dark eyes” and by merely having a certain look upon her face, Sheila read it to be insulting, envied her, and this infuriated her even further. So, driven by this episode, Sheila decided to take action. After being “rude to both of them,” she complained to the manager and let him know that she had found Eva to be “very impertinent” and wished for her to be fired. She even threatened to persuade her mother, an important customer, to shut down her account at the store if her wishes were not taken on board.
Not even having a real excuse, Sheila abused her power of money in order to strip Eva of a second job. Having not even considered Eva’s future plans, Sheila was happy to destroy her present life because of her petulant nature. She appears to be a rather superficial and selfish person, but as the play unfolds, we learn that this is not the case. In reality, Sheila is an excited and pleasant individual, who although is short tempered on occasion, is mainly a lively, pretty girl. Her intention was not to put Eva on the streets at all, and she states that “if she had been a miserable plain little creature, I wouldn’t have done it. But she was pretty and looked as if she could take care of herself. ” She did what she did as a form of punishment for making her feel jealous after the ‘incident’ with the dress.
Being the complete opposite of her father, Sheila accepts full responsibility for her actions, and is sorry for the trouble they have caused. “I felt rotten about it at the time and now I feel a lot worse.” Sheila redeems herself slightly here, and also is seen as a better person by the audience for accepting her mistakes and learning from it, rather than taking example from, and being influenced by her father, who refused to believe he had anything to do with the whole concept. “If I could help her now, I would-”
“And the rest of you did what you did to her. It’s still the same rotten story whether it’s been told to a police inspector or to somebody else.” Agreeing wholeheartedly and sincerely with this part of Eric’s speech, Sheila redresses her previous actions. It shows that she has learned from the events and has shown that although she likes the material things in the community surrounding her, she is not deeply affected by them.
“But she was very pretty and looked as if she could take care of herself. I couldn’t be sorry for her.”
- Sheila Birling
The performance is carried on with as much enthusiasm as before and now we find out that Gerald Croft, son of Sir Croft and Lady Croft, had a part to play in Eva’s downfall too. Gerald is “an attractive chap, rather manly, well-bred young man-about-town.” His involvement in the play, aside from Eva Smith, is that of his engagement to Sheila. He comes across as a charming and receptive man, but we learn as the show goes on, that he does resemble Mr Birling in many ways.
Shortly after having been ‘let go’ from Milwards, Eva had decided she needed a fresh start, and so she changed her name to Daisy Renton, and Gerald instantly recognises the name when it is spoken. After she had changed her name and started a new kind of life, he had met her at a bar in the Palace, a local music hall. It was a “favourite haunt of women of the town.” Not planning on staying long, he had noticed Eva, a “pretty girl”, completely the opposite of the “hard-eyed dough-faced women.” Seeing Alderman Meggarty advancing on her, Gerald went and ‘rescued’ her and took her to the County Hotel. They talked and she introduced herself as Daisy Renton. When she told him she was hungry, he arranged for the hotel to provide food for her, and then when he found out that she had no real accommodation, he again found her some rooms to live in. So once again, Eva, or Daisy, was in a stable condition, this time with Gerald. Although she does not recognise the signs, Gerald is in a very high, superior position in comparison with Eva, and is under a ‘sense of obligation.’ She relies on Gerald far too much, and becomes an inferior when in his presence. As time went on however, Gerald was seeing her regularly, and while she was falling in love with him, he was taking advantage of her as her love was not reciprocated. Gerald decided after a few months that he could not continue the affair, and “broke it off definitely” before he went away on business. He regretted ever starting the whole relationship, especially at the time at which he ended it as Eva informed him at this point that “she’d been happier than she’d ever been before,” but also stated clearly that she knew that it would never have lasted and did not blame Gerald at all.
He does make slight amends by ensuring she has enough money to last her through the rest of the year. Thinking of the way he treated her, he is “rather more – upset – by this business than he probably appears to be.” He uses his social status and his wealth in order to make her a victim. If he had not become involved with her and used his money and ‘connections’ in order to provide Eva with a haven for a while, then she would not have felt indebted to him, the situation may not have been as bad as it turned out to be. By now, following the events involving Mr Birling, Sheila and Gerald, they have all with their combined behaviour, pushed Eva far enough to make her leave Brumley, in order for her to “be alone, be quiet, and to just make it last longer.”
“I became at once the most important person in her life,”
- Gerald Croft
The fourth person the inspector chooses to question is Mr Birling’s social superior and aristocratic wife, Mrs Sybil Birling. Having been born into this lifestyle, she is a typical upper-class woman with time to waste and money to spend. Not expected to partake in the household chores, she spends a great deal of her spare time, in charitable work, specifically dealing with a women’s organisation. Mrs Birling is shown to be a cold and rather unforgiving character. She is highly opinionated and is a firm believer in separation of the classes. For example, when Mr Birling asks her to tell cook that the food was good, she responds by saying “Arthur, you’re not supposed to say such things-”
Mrs Birling can easily be seen as the final push that drove Eva to suicide. Being a “prominent member of the committee,” Mrs Birling uses her power and influence within the ‘Brumley Women’s Charity Organisation’ and turned down Eva’s desperate plea for help to support her unborn child. On hearing Eva refer to herself as Mrs Birling, Sybil becomes immediately prejudice against her, thinking she is being impertinent.
“And Mother did what she did.” This particular line in Eric’s speech is quite ironic, because in Mrs Birling’s opinion, she has done nothing to be ashamed of, and believes that Eva had “only herself to blame.” She therefore refuses to accept responsibility for her actions. She justifies her reasoning by claiming she was fulfilling her duty, but also, she brings the father of Eva’s child into the equation by stating that she blamed him too and that it was his responsibility. She again shows her belief in distinction between the classes by bringing forth the conception that it was all the more reason for the father to accept responsibility, taking into consideration that he should not have been a “drunken young idler,” from a superior class to her own.
“You’re quite wrong to suppose I shall regret what I did.”
- Mrs. Sybil Birling
Although he is the last to be questioned, Eric’s role in the play is the most effective. Having had a “public-school-and-Varsity life,” he has a rather dictated perception of society from his parents. He is described as a “half shy, half assertive” person, not fully content with his life. Having a poor relationship with his parents, Eric finds that he does not have his father’s trust or his mother’s affection, “You’re not the kind of father a chap could go to when he’s in trouble.” and he has little respect for them. His own mother doesn’t know about his drinking habits and his father is still clueless about the money that was stolen from his office. He is treated as a child by almost everyone, excluding only Sheila.
His acquaintance with Eva was in a brief period of time. He had seen her at the Palace one night and had started talking to her. Both of them had been a bit “squiffy” but Eric more so than Eva. He was not in a state to know what he was doing and had ended up forcing his way into her lodgings, and taking advantage of her. “The hellish thing” however was that he could not remember a thing in the morning. They had met again a fortnight later by pure chance, again in the Palace, but this time, Eric “wasn’t so bad.” This time, they talked a bit\and then he took advantage of Eva again. Eric did not describe this as love making but instead, said, “I liked her - she was pretty and a good sport-” When they met up the next few times however, Eva informed him that she was going to have a baby, and although Eric was “in a hell of a state about it,” he tried to do the noble thing by staying with her and providing money to support her and the baby, but she refused to take anymore, He had given her fifty pounds altogether. Eva “treated him as if he were a kid,” and told him that she did not want to get married to Eric because he did not love her, and when she found out that he had stolen the money, she had told him “she didn’t want to see him again.”
Eric is very sorry and upset by this whole episode and when he discovers that it was his mother who turned her down for help without even understanding the situation, he gets very angry. “You killed her. She came to you to protect me, and you killed her – and the child too – my child – your own grandchild – damn you.” He is very ashamed of himself, and takes full responsibility for his actions. By at least trying to do the right thing, but going about it in the wrong way, it shows that Eric does not care so much for class, or society as he does about accepting his mistakes. He is the one person aside from Sheila that knows he has done something to contribute to the downfall of Eva Smith and he admits it freely as opposed to his parents.
“I insisted on giving her money to keep her going – until she refused to take anymore –”
- Eric Birling
In comparison with Mr Birling, Mrs Birling and Gerald, Sheila and Eric, although younger, learn more from the happening.
Even though it is Mr Birling is focused on his business to think about anyone else, the initial motive to work that hard to keep costs down, and to act the was he does came from Mrs Birling. His priority is to earn a lot of money to provide for his family, and more to keep them occupied, but by trying to live up to her expectations and reaching the same social standards to match hers, Mrs Birling does in fact have an unknown influence on the way he thinks, and what his actions are. “Nothing much has happened!”
Mrs Birling had the most influence on everyone’s actions, although she was not aware of it. Her influence on Mr Birling made him into the type of person she herself is, and this affects Sheila and Eric too. This is because with both Mr and Mrs Birling acting like Mrs Birling, they are growing up to behave the way she does. This influences them heavily as they are being dictated to by both Mr and Mrs Birling in the manner at all times. She treats her children as if they were still ten-years old. This affects their way of thinking and acting.
Gerald has been brought up into a similar social background to that of Mrs Birling too, and he too is influenced by his parents about how and which decisions are to be made. He comes across as a gentleman, but does not show any of the qualities that would actually make him one. He had cheated on Sheila in order to be with Eva, but then when he was finished with Eva, he went straight back to Sheila. Even at the end of the story after having admitted what he did, he comes back and says “the man wasn’t a police officer,” and honestly thinks that everything that had just happened can be forgotten about.
Eric has learned the most about himself, his family and about the consequences, though not normally this extreme, of his actions. It teaches him to think about what he is doing and about whether or not he should go ahead with what he wants to do, for example stealing the money. Had he though carefully, he may have come up with a different solution to provide Eva with some money, and that in turn may have kept her alive as a result.
Sheila took the news more harshly than expected. She knew that she had done something wrong, but only really understood when it was pointed out to her by the inspector. Having gone through the instigation, she realised where she had gone wrong and although she had already made her mistake, she learned from it well, and realised that her actions too can be careless and affect someone else’s life.
All in all, I feel that the play was a case of ‘role-reversal’ and it was the children, Eric and Sheila learning the lesson that this play had to offer, and they had to then teach it to their parents, who had not learnt anything when the play was over, and were very stubborn in not admitting when they were wrong. Gerald, I feel, is in between the two halves of the family. He did recognise that he had made a mistake, but even after realising this, he did not make an effort to learn from it, but instead went and tried to find a way out of the situation by finding out that the inspector was not real.
“It’s still the same rotten story whether it’s been told to a police inspector or to somebody else.”
- Eric Birling
