Priestley has the Inspector talks to each one of the characters in the family, individually throughout the whole play, which puts each of them in the spotlight. This shows that they are all responsible and they all contributed to Eva’s death, which relates to the quotation in the title “We are responsible for each other”. The end of the play is a cliff-hanger, leaving the audience guessing what might happen next, so the play remains in their thoughts, causing them to also think about changing the society in which they live.
Priestley conveys his main theme in the way Mr Birling doesn’t care about anyone and just wants to get to the top of society and doesn’t care who he steps on, on the way, he says “they could go and work somewhere else. It’s a free country I told them”. Priestley is trying to get across to the audience that this isn’t how you should act as it says in the quotation, “We are members of one body,” and everyone is needed to complete the body and here Mr Birling is portraying that he doesn’t care about anybody else and can run his business without their help. Priestley uses dramatic irony when Mr Birling says, “rapid progress everywhere - except Russia of course, which will always be behind naturally”, and as Mr Birling is the man of the house and we know that Mr Birling is wrong showing he’s a bit bigheaded. Mr Birling is also the first person that the Inspector speaks to in the play and because he is so inconsiderate he thinks that the Inspector has just come to see him, “you didn’t come here just to see me, then?” which shows he thinks of himself first and doesn’t really care about society.
Priestley uses the Birling family to convey his main aim because with more than one person he can show that “We are all responsible for each other” and to show a contrast between generations; Eric and Sheila are in their early twenties and Gerald, Mr and Mrs Birling were thirty and above. This is significant as Eric and Sheila seem to be the only ones who realise Priestley’s main aim. Shelia learns so much from the Inspectors visit. “We can all go on behaving just as we did” she said sarcastically because she still knows what happened and doesn’t want anyone to commit suicide. Mr Birling learns the least, “look, you’d better ask Gerald for that ring you gave back to him, hadn’t you?” which shows they are opposites; Mr Birling thinks he’s always right and Sheila does what she is told. Mr Birling only seems to care about his business, “look, you’d better ask Gerald for that ring you gave back to him, hadn’t you?” he said to Sheila after they discovered that the first Inspector was a fake. This indicates that he cares more about his business than his daughter’s feelings as he only wants Sheila to marry Gerald so he and the Crofts can run a business. Priestley tries to show this as being wrong because in today’s society this wouldn’t happen, demonstrating that Priestley’s main aim was successful as now society has changed in that field in western culture but it has not been successful in other places.
Mrs Birling seems to think that she did the right thing when Eva came to her for help, but the audience can see that what she did was wrong. Priestley made Mrs Birling like this so that the audience will realise that some of them are like that and will persuade them to change the way they look at things therefore changing society. Priestley uses various dramatic devices to convey his main aim in the play, such as dramatic irony with Mr Birling, “There’ll be peace and prosperity,” as we know there will be two world wars within the next 40 years of when the play is set. This is well used by Priestley as it shows that Mr Birling is wrong and the audience should not take his advice but should think about the rest of the play. There is only one piece of humour in the play between the Inspector, Eric and Mr Birling where they are talking about golf and the Inspector says, “I don’t play golf”, Mr Birling says “I don’t suppose you did,” then Eric says “Well I think it’s a damn shame”, then the Inspector says, “No, I’ve never wanted to play”. This lightens the mood of the play as the Inspector first comes across as a serious character when Mr Birling offers him a port and he replies, “No, thank you, Mr Birling. I’m on duty”. This adds contrast to the play that shows life won’t be boring if we do change but would be much better than it is.
An extremely dramatic part of the play is at the end of act 2 when Sheila knew that Eva was pregnant with Eric’s child and Mrs Birling didn’t realise this and said that the man who got Eva pregnant should be “compelled to confess in public,” then she realises its Eric. This is especially dramatic as the worst thing to happen to Mrs Birling is to have her rank in society be dropped which is exactly what would happen if Eric had done what she said the man who got Eva pregnant should do.
I think Inspector Goole represents Priestley as he is the main character and is the one with a mystery behind him. The Inspector says the quotation in the above question which presents all of Priestley main aims. Priestley manages to use the Inspector to get things out of the characters and is also trying to get the audience to admit to certain things and wants them to feel regret for living in such a bad society. Priestley believed in time travelling so the Inspector could also be a time traveller and the Inspector could keep coming back until everyone in the family realises that they need to change. The Inspector is the most powerful character in the play as he controls the other characters and can extract as much or as little as he wants out of them. He also asks questions which forces the play forward or changes the theme and allows the characters to develop. The Inspector always knows more than the characters so he asks questions that he already knows the answers to so he can get any information from the characters that he desires. The audience listens to the Inspector because he behaves so calmly but says the most awful things, “She’s dead”. This helps to express Priestley main aim as the audience remembers him because he was so strange and unpleasant, thus they remember his main aim. The Inspector’s final speech uses the word “we” many times in the play which makes it seem like he is not just talking to the characters but to the audience as well, making it clear that he wants our society to change.
I think this play was very successful as we have seen differences to our society since then already. Priestley play was very effective as it makes the audience feel that an Inspector could call on them at anytime, which forces them to think before doing something wrong. It also makes you focus on the Inspector the most because of his attitude as he is the one trying to get the point across to the audience; that we need to change our ways. It is still relevant to today as people are still doing things today that set off a chain of events to cause something else to happen. The play has defiantly affected me as it makes you think about what you are doing and how you should act.
