Questions and Answers on "An Inspector Calls"

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Agustina Paterno, Nadja Maingard, Maria Pierretti, Florencia Keip Val        

An Inspector Calls

  1. What do we learn about each of the characters on stage in the opening stage directions? How might the actors show that the characters and pleased with themselves?

 

In the opening stage direction we learn that four members compose the Birling’s family. This family has a maid, called Edna. Arthur Birling is Sheila and Eric's father. He is a heavy-looking, rather portentous man in his middle fifties with fairly easy manners but rather provincial in his speech. Sybil, his wife, is about fifty and is rather a cold woman and her husband's social superior; and is the daughter of a more important family. Her daughter, Sheila, is a pretty girl in her early twenties, very pleased with life and rather excited. Her brother, Eric, is also in his early twenties, not quite at ease, half shy, half assertive. Also in this stage direction it is presented Sheila's fiancé, Gerald Croft, who is described as an attractive chap about thirty, rather too manly to be a dandy but very much that easy well-bred young man-about-town.

        

  1. What tone is set in the opening exchanges between the characters?

The tone set in the opening exchanges between the characters seems to be warm and kind. The whole family is celebrating a special ocassion, the engagement between Sheila Birling and Gerald Croft.

  1. What does Sheila’s engagement to Gerald mean to Arthur Birling?

Sheila's engagement to Gerald means a lot to Arthur Birling. He believes that Sheila is going to make him happy, and Gerald is going to make her happy too. In addition, Gerald is just the kind of son-in-law Mr. Birling always wanted. And because he always had been a friendly rival with his son in law father, this engagement will perhaps bring together the two businesses and will no longer compete.

  1. What is Birling’s attitude to the future and the progress he foresees? What are we meant to think of this attitude and why?

Birling's attitude to the future is very optimistic and positive. He believes that the Germans do not want to start war, like nobody else, except for some half-civilized folks in the Balkans. He is talking as a hard - headed, practical man of business, saying that there is no chance of war.

Moreover, he says that the Titanic is unsinkable.  
Even though his positive point of view of war and the Titanic, the readers know that war took place and that the Titanic has sunk. This literary device is called Dramatic Irony, because the readers know that what the character is saying is incorrect and that it already happened.

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  1. How does the tone change once the men are alone?

The tone changes when Sheila, Mrs. Birling and Eric leave the room. Now it’s serious. Both men start talking genuinely and the Inspector starts asking Mr. Birling questions that made him uncomfortable but he had no choice but to answer him with the truth.

  1. What outlook on life has Birling learnt in the ‘good hard school of experience’?

Birling's outlook of life that he had learnt in the “Good hard school of experience" is that a man has ...

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A good response in which all the points made are correct and demonstrate an understanding of the play. There is a need for further exploration in order to develop the responses further. The points made would also benefit from quotations in support. There is a need to proof-read in order to amend errors in spelling, punctuation and grammar. ***