What is the role and of the significance of the Inspector?

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What is the role and his significance in the Inspector?

        The Birling family are a capitalist family who do not care for society, only themselves. The inspector arrives just after Mr Birling talks about his views on life. He says

        “I’ve learned in the good hard school of experiences - that man has to mind his own business and look after himself and his own - and-”(pg 10)

        The inspectors role is to show that this is not the case and that they are part of a community. Throughout the play he demonstrates how people are responsible for how they affect the lives of others; his views are summed up in his prophecy and dramatic final speech: that

        “we are members of one body. We are responsible for each other” (p.56).

Priestley describes the Inspector, when he first appears on stage, in terms of         “massiveness, solidity and purposefulness” (p.11),

symbolizing the fact that he is an unstoppable force within the play. He controls the development of events: who will speak and when; who may or may not leave; who will or will not see the photograph. He manages them to do as he says, as he has a          “disconcerting habit of looking hard at the person he addresses before speaking” (p.11)

        This gives the impression that he sees through each character to the real person in them, looking for he truth. It also gives him a thoughtfulness in him and shows that he cares for the girl which is a contrasts with the thoughtlessness of each character's treatment of the girl, which led to her death.

        His other main role in the play is not simply to confront each character with the truth, but to force each character to admit the truth they already know, which is hidden deep inside them. Without the inspector, none of the characters would haven't released the truth in them, and none of them would have changed. He works carefully through characters present one at a time, partly because he recognizes that 'otherwise, there's a muddle' (p.12), mainly because they all have the chance to defend themselves otherwise. Mr Birling uses his powerful friends at work as a use of bullying the inspector. But the Inspector easily overpowers each person as he

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         “takes charge, masterfully.”

        All of the characters are responsible for Eva Smiths death. But each of the characters react in different ways. The Inspector tells each of the characters that

        “if you're easy with me, I'm easy with you” (p.22)

He has compassion for those who are willing to accept their responsibility, but nothing so simple as forgiveness. After all, 'the girl's (still) dead though'.

The inspector aims firstly at Birling who sacked Eva Smith from her job 2 years ago. Mr Birling had no feeling of guilt when the Inspector told him that that girl he sacked ...

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