He arrives just after Birling has been setting out his views of life: that every man must only look out for himself. The message in this is that justice, which is one of the interpretations of the Inspector, does not agree with Birling’s selfish views, and that justice will prevail and interrupt people’s thoughts. The Inspector's role is to show that this is not the case. Throughout the play he demonstrates how people are responsible for how they affect the lives of others; his views are summed up in his visionary and dramatic final speech: that “we are members of one body. We are responsible for each other” (p.56). Responsibility is one of the play's two key themes, and the Inspector is Priestley's vehicle for putting across his own views of this as a socialist. In this final speech, he is speaking as much to the audience as to the characters on stage. His words here are a warning to an audience in 1945 not to repeat the selfish mistakes that led to the “fire and blood and anguish” of two World Wars and the years between them. We learn that we should be changing our attitudes towards the way we treat people of a lower social class than ours, as they are human beings too, no matter what. The words “fire and blood and anguish” are like Biblical language, and also magic three, which help emphasise his point and make it more dramatic. The passage also anticipates World War One, in the sense that at the very end, the Inspector says "if men will not learn that lesson, they will be taught it in “fire and blood and anguish" - this, to the Birlings, is a prophetic statement, but the reader and audience are aware of it as it has already come to pass. To emphasise that idea, the Inspector lengthens the list of words he mentions; instead of just using a comma between "fire" and "blood", he chooses to use 'and', which sensationalises the comment and makes it sound somewhat more important than if he had just normally listed those specific words.
I feel that this particular speech concludes the Inspector's reason for being at the Birlings' house, and the effect that it has on the audience and reader as well as the characters is quite similar. The Inspector's speech shows frequent emotive language to trigger feelings in the audience, which then reminds them of their own errors in the past - Priestley's main incentive for writing this play was to make society realise their mistakes, look back on them and learn from them; the audience and reader have already experienced World War One and economic hardship, and so this speech is just a reminder of what they ultimately got themselves into - it's like watching their own mistakes occur in retrospect.
Birling becomes increasingly annoyed by the Inspector's questioning and by Eric's unsympathetic attitude towards his decision. "…I don't see that it's any concern of yours how I choose to run my business, is it now?” This shows that the tension is growing rapidly in the room. Mr Birling is becoming quite aggressive. This might be caused by the fact that he is slightly frightened by the Inspector. This could also show that he is in denial, as he has devoted his whole life away to be rich, only to find his lifestyle is wrong.
Mr Birling tries to threaten the Inspector by talking about his relationship with the chief constable. "…I ought to warn you that he's an old friend of mine…we play golf together.” This shows that he thinks that as he is of a higher social class, he can easily threaten and blackmail the Inspector. However, the Inspector replies “I don't play golf,” to this. This shows that the Inspector doesn't take a lot of notice of the threats that Birling makes to him. This shows that justice cannot be bought.
The inspector is also rude. He says to Mr Birling 'Don’t stammer and yammer at me again, man'. This is very rude considering Mr Birling is a very influential person in society and he is also a very good friend with the head of the police force. This shows to the audience that the inspector is not intimidated by the high status of the Birlings. The message here is that no matter what social class a person is, the Inspector, or the conscience of a person will always stay the same. The audience learns from this that no matter what class you are, justice will always be the same. The audience also learns that justice is not dictated by how much money you have or what your social class is, it is ordained by your deeds.
The inspector emphasises his points, which reflects his “massiveness” and “solidity.” The inspector tells Mr Birling sharply that “Your daughter isn’t living on the moon. She’s here in Brumley too.” The language used here portrays the message that women in the upper-class should not be tied up in a cocoon. The fact that he says it ‘sharply’ could suggest that, though it may hurt to hear about it, Sheila does know about the society and its corruption, no matter how hard the family tries to keep her away from it.
The inspector is very tactical in his approach to solving the investigation and has an excellent method of making the characters confess to their part in the suicide of Eva Smith. He is very rude, bossy, and assertive in what he says. I think that all these attributes play an important part in the confessions of the characters. The inspector allows Mrs Birling a look at the photograph of Eva Smith and asks her ‘You recognise her?’ she replies ‘No. Why should I?’ and he says ‘you’re not telling me the truth’. This shows that he has not come to find out the truth because it seems that he already knows the truth. This shows how assertive he is. He goes through the people in chronological order. I think that the fact that he is very firm and bossy shows that he disregards their status. He is always in control and he takes charge right from the start. To show Mrs. Birling’s arrogance she is encircled in a warm colour such as red, but it is important to blend this colour in with the rest of the stage, as otherwise she would look like an alien. The rest of the stage is bathed in a cool murky blue; I believe that this will show as depressing and symbolise that the Inspector has beaten the characters. The role of the character in this is to make them aware that justice has beaten them, and has shown everyone what the upper-class are really like. The message behind this is that the upper-class must be unmasked as selfish, to help the audience help themselves to be better people.
The Inspector is the catalyst for the events of the play: without him, none of the characters' secrets would ever have come into the open, for a variety of reasons. Birling could not see that he did anything memorable or wrong in sacking a troublemaker; Sheila thought her rather spiteful jealousy of a pretty shop-assistant was not “anything very terrible at the time” (p.24); Gerald needed to conceal his involvement with the girl from a jealous fiancée; Mrs Birling is too cold ever to “have known what [the girl] was feeling” (p.45) and her effect seems lost on her; and Eric had resorted to theft, which he too needed to conceal. Without the Inspector's 'purposefulness', each character could not or would not have acknowledged their behaviour.
The Inspector's sombre appearance and the news he brings are a contrast with the happy and elegant air of celebration on stage. His name, Goole (ghoul?), gives him a mysterious, disturbing quality - a ghoul is a spirit which takes fresh life from corpses, and we could certainly argue that the Inspector's existence is a result of the girl's death. If he is not a real Inspector, what is he? A clever impostor (but nonetheless human)? The personification of the social conscience the characters all lack or suppress? A supernatural, God-like being (for he certainly seems to know what each character has done, without being told)? The reproachful spirit of the girl's dead child? These questions go through the mind of the audience, and, in a way, help the audience be more involved in the play.
The Inspector has a moral dimension that makes him different from an ordinary policeman: he is more concerned with right and wrong than with what is legal. He sternly tells Birling, for example, that “it's better to ask for the earth [as a worker might do] than to take it [which Birling does]” (p.15). This sends a message to the audience that people should consider others before rushing ahead to do things, and take into account the effects it could have on people. The Inspector tells 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 message in this is that, though they feel compassion and guilt towards the death of Eva Smith, it will still not bring her back to life, and therefore, they will have to take lessons from what they have done, and be sure not to commit them in future.
Throughout the whole play, Birling deems himself as all-knowing, and makes assumptions such as the Titanic is “unsinkable, absolutely unsinkable.” Of course we know that the Titanic did sink, and therefore, his predictions did not come true. However, he thinks that just because he said it, people should take his word for it, as he is of the higher social class. He also subtly suggests that as he is of the social class, he should be deemed to be some sort of God, so it were. Priestly is trying to portray the point that the upper classes were very ignorant and smarmy and they lived in their own perfect world. The actual audience were the upper class and the survivors from the World Wars
Mr Birling's first priority is to make money. "It's my duty to keep the labour costs down" He does this because he is trying not to give too much money away, but instead, trying to keep the bulk of it for himself
Mr Birling is a wealthy, pompous man who loves to show off his good fortune to other members of the community who he is trying to impress. You could say he was ostentatious. He is a prosperous owner of his factory, Birling and Company. "…a self-made man…" He started his business from nothing and worked his way up, until he was a wealthy man. This explains to us that he made himself what he is today through hard work.
"…I'm talking as a hard-headed, practical man of business." He uses his experience to give advice to the younger generation. Mr Birling is mainly giving this advice to Gerald, as he is trying to impress him. The message given here is that the upper-class may think they know it all, but in fact, they are just as limited minded as the rest of us.
On page 6 Birling talks of the marriage as if it was a business deal. He then shows his sheer pomposity as he talks about issues like he knows more than the experts. He disregards all the reports he has heard of war on the verge of breakout, to that he says “fiddlesticks” and "The Germans don’t want war. Nobody wants war, except some half-civilised folks in the Balkans.” He is stating his superiority to some kind of inferior race there, but ironically he is proven wrong, and the audience know it, because when the play was written the 2nd world war had just ended. The audience knows all to well that Birling’s attitude is wrong. This puts across Priestly’s anger towards the pompous upper-class know-it-all’s who don’t really know anything. It shows how the world wasn’t prepared for the War, but it should have been, it was just ignorant. His message is for the people to realise that all the death must be for something, and we need change in attitude especially in people like Birling.
Mr Birling’s and Sheila’s character have very few similarities. This is shown in the very first act, by the language both father and daughter use. Sheila uses slang, whereas Mr Birling, being a very “important” and “respectable” character, uses no such slang. “You’re squiffy.” She uses this expression to tell her brother, Eric that he is drunk. Her use of slang expressions, helps to emphasise her youth whereas Mr Birling’s words as well as language clearly emphasise how pompous he is. He is full of “self-importance” and feels what he has to say is most important. When he interrupts Eric, “just let me finish, Eric,” he doesn’t even stop to consider that Eric may have something of some importance to say.
During the start of the play, the Birling’s are celebrating the engagement of their daughter, Sheila, to Gerald. When Gerald gives the ring to Sheila. her whole mood changes to that of excitement and delight. This shows how the upper classes attach so much value to inanimate objects and how they have very materialistic beliefs. Gerald covers up anything he has done wrong by giving the ring, more than as a sign of love. It was probably more to do with guilt form his affair with Eva. I think Priestly is showing this, as he is annoyed that upper-class people attach more value to objects than to love and important qualities like that. He believes the poor to be more genuine people as they really show their emotions and are more caring than richer people.
After the exit of the inspector, the family find out that the inspector was a hoax. Mr Birling comes off the phone and says that ‘there is no Inspector Goole on the police. That man wasn’t a police inspector at all’.
At this point, the audience must make a decision as to who or what the Inspector really was. The audience must decide as to whether the Inspector was really from a ‘fourth dimension’ and was something from out of this world – the name of the inspector also adds weight to this suggestion because his name is Inspector Goole. The name Goole indicates something supernatural. It could have been someone from the future in an attempt to warn the family. Or did the inspector symbolise the conscience of the characters? The reader must answer the problem.
The Inspector’s speech on responsibility is something that was very significant. Priestley purposely put this section into the play to make people aware of their responsibilities in society. He explains that everybody should be responsible for his or her part in society and if there is misuse of ones authority in society they will have to face the consequences. He says 'if men do not learn that lesson then they will be taught it in fire and blood and anguish'. This shows that the consequence will be hell. The Inspector emphasises in many sections of the play the agony that Eva died in. He says, 'Her position now is that she lies with a burnt-out inside on a slab'. This is in an attempt to make them realise that the things that they do every without even thinking twice about, could have serious consequences. Priestley also portrays this message to the audience.
At the end of the play, it is seen that Eric and Sheila, who represent the youths, change the most, as they are the most impressionable. This is seen when Eric says: “That doesn’t matter to me. The one I knew is dead.” The person representing the upper class, Gerald, does not change. Furthermore, the older generation, i.e. Mr and Mrs. Birling, do not change at all. I think Eric and Sheila both changed the most, but also, the audience also must have changed upon watching this play, as Priestley prey’s on their conscience, and in a clever way at that.
Mr Birling is put across as a very pompous man who is wealthy and has a lot of status. He is very arrogant and selfish, and has little or no emotions towards other people. He feels no empathy, which gestures that he has been stonehearted the day he was born. He also overlooks the fact that people of his own class partake in debauchery and other such misdemeanours. This is emphasised when Eric says, “I hate these fat old tarts around town, the ones I see your respectable friends with.” This shows that, though Birling believes his friends to be infallible, they are, in actual fact, worse than the lower-class people who never stoop to such low-levels if they can help it.
Even at the end of the book, Mr Birling is still worried about his status when he mentions: “Most of this is bound to come out. There’ll be a public scandal.” This shows that he has not learnt anything, and he is still worried about his status, and whether he is to be shamed. He, his wife and Gerald are the only people in this play not to learn anything.
This play can be interpreted in different ways. In the 1900s, it could be interpreted, and was interpreted, as a play that emphasised in collective responsibility, and how society must help each other to help enhance society itself.
Commenting from the point of a Muslim in the 21st Century, I interpret this play as right and wrong in some ways. Priestley may be trying to put across the point that we all have collective responsibility, but I believe that one cannot get blamed for another person’s actions. This is because humans are born with free will, and therefore, can decide against suicide. Though they may be poverty-stricken and on the streets, suicide is always the last resort and because of that, other people cannot get blamed. Sure, the people who helped her lead up to it can get be made to share a little responsibility, the main responsibility of the death lies with Eva Smith herself, as she took her own life. Furthermore, it is not moral to kill oneself. There are laws against it and it's not even enjoyable, in fact, it’s the lowest resort, so there is just not any justification for it. When deliberating over the morality of suicide, it is necessary to also bring into the discussion those cases in which death is a highly possible risk, but not an intention, and the question of intervention, psychopathology and autonomy.
Eva Smith was close to death, and so, committing suicide was wrong, because dying of natural causes is considered to be dying with dignity. Suicide is the intentional killing of oneself and something that is downplayed and thought of as derogatory to the community. If this play emphasises on collective responsibility, then surely corrupting one’s society because of a derogatory act such as suicide is also wrong.
Those who hold that life is sacred, maintain that killing is not morally permissible and furthermore, that we should not shorten a worthwhile life. If society abandons the sanctity of life then we shall be living not as human beings in a society ever on the increase and caring for one another, but as a society of mass murderers who take lives and have no appreciation of the sanctity of life. People who commit suicide have no regards for sanctity of life, and neither does mass murders or terrorists. They can therefore, be categorised in same plain. This argument makes one see that suicide is wrong and should not be used.
However, I do agree with most of Priestley’s messages, such as status is wrong, and labelling people under status names is just silly. This causes such problems as thinking oneself higher than another human being. We see Mr Birling doing that when he says “And then she got herself unto trouble there I suppose.” This shows that society at the time thought that just because people are poor, they cause trouble. Another message that is well put-across using the Inspector, and is a vital message is that we should all have collective responsibility for each other, for without looking out for each other, society will be on a moralistic decline.
Furthermore, segregation of people is wrong as we are all human and we are all equal. Segregating people away from ourselves would mean that we do not see what the people are really like, and leads to such problems, such as prejudice, where a person pre-judges another person.
Pushing forth, Priestley shows that, though the upper-class people , especially the families, may be seen to think the same, they are actually quite different from each other. This is a particular message that is laid across using the Birling family, who have just realised that they do not agree with each other’s thinking.
Nevertheless, another message that is presented is that, though the Birling’s are upper class, Mr and Mrs Birling need to learn to take responsibility. This is a message for the individual, as well as the whole community, which emphasises the point that if you know you are at fault, accept the responsibility, as you are only lying to yourself if you don’t. Sheila tells them to stop lying to themselves when she says, “Stop these silly pretences.” This shows that, though she is still young and shielded from the real world, she sees the truth that the Birling’s never did, or never will see, and she knows that the family is lying to each other.
Before long, Eric realises that this man was not out of the ordinary, and he was the Birlings’ conscience. This is seen when he says: “He was our Police Inspector.” This also helps emphasise the fact to the audience that they must stop and listen to their conscience before allowing such derogatory acts to continue in society.
Each character is punished in an appropriate way. Birling fears for his family's reputation at the inquest; Sheila feels shame for her selfishness; Gerald has his affair revealed in front of Sheila; Mrs Birling has her illusions about the respectability of her family shattered by Eric; and Eric is revealed before his indulgent parents as a spoilt and inadequate young man. In each case the punishment is a consequence of their own behaviour; the Inspector himself does not bring punishment from outside. Perhaps this is why they are given a second chance at the end of the play - that their experience should have been a warning to them, and that next time, it is the apocalyptic future predicted by the Inspector's final speech that lies in store for them and for us.
Priestley has used a lot of emotive language in his last speech, such as "hopes", "fears", "suffering", "happiness", "blood" and "anguish". In turn, this causes the Inspector's speech to be quite blunt, as the sentences that these words are woven into are short, abrupt and straight to the point - mirroring the Inspector's duration at the Birlings' residence. As well as this, the Inspector's speech makes good use of the word 'we', uniting the Birlings with the people that they feel they are superior to - poor people. By the way that the Inspector declares "we are members of one body. We are responsible for each other", he makes clever use of the word 'are', which in turn finalises the idea that we are members of one body, and we are responsible for one another. It is also contradictory to a section of one of Arthur Birling's speeches: "By the way some of these cranks talk and write now, you'd think everybody has to look after everybody else" which is the complete opposite to what the Inspector is announcing.
Priestley's “An Inspector Calls” and Dickens' “A Christmas Carol” have strong messages for the reader. Charles Dickens wrote "A Christmas Carol" in 1843 in the form of a novel, it was very successful and is still popular today. The play "An Inspector Calls," was written in 1945 by J.B Priestly and was set in 1912. These two texts are similar as they both convey a message that we should follow and live by. The author's views are quite similar as they both refer to middle class and working class in socialist terms.
Dickens wrote A Christmas Carol in 1843 to aware people of the homeless children living in terrible conditions, and to make the audience feel sorry for these children. He also conveyed the message that the upper-class should be responsible for children in poor conditions.
Like Dickens, Priestley wanted people to be aware that people in the lower-classes also suffer, and that people from the upper-class should be living as a whole body, to help take care of those of the lower-castes.
In conclusion, Priestley wanted to ensure life after the war was better than before and he hoped that through his writing he could influence people’s ideas and change society. Although he wrote an ‘Inspector Calls’ in 1945 he deliberately set it in 1912 because that time represented the sort of society everybody wanted to leave behind. He was particularly concerned about the living conditions of the lower classes, represented by Eva, and the way the upper classes behaved, represented by the Birling’s and Gerald Croft. He believed that we should all help each other which is the total opposite from what the Birlings believed. He uses the inspector to symbolise the conscience of the nation and through him challenges each of the characters who represent a part of society. He shows that change is more likely to come through the young (Sheila and Eric) rather than through the older generation (Mr & Mrs Birling) or the upper classes symbolised by Gerald Croft. I think Priestly is trying to say that some people will never change especially the older generation.
Throughout the play priestly uses dramatic devices to maintain the audiences interests, such as who was the Inspector, priestly makes the audience think all through the play that, who exactly is the Inspector, priestly makes the Inspector a "mysterious Inspector" (introduction).
Other dramatic devices which are used is, the photo, is it the same, how is everything linked in the "chain of events" and the setting of the play which is all in a dining room with rosy lighting (romantic and happy atmosphere) but changes as the Inspector steps in ("mysterious Inspector")
These are a number of dramatic devices that Priestley uses to maintain the audience’s interest. These things will definitely happen and the audience knows it. This is dramatic irony. Priestly is trying to say that upper-class people are too busy making money and they don't like to think something that could happen.
The role of the inspector though must be stressed, and that if he weren’t there, none of the plot would have unravelled. He used his influence to stamp his authority, and showed that even though none of the Birling’s had committed a crime, they were all made to feel guilty because of the misuse of their power in society, and for not looking after the lower-class people, which was their responsibility. “Public men, Mr Birling, have responsibilities as well as privileges.” This message is still relevant to a 21st century audience because society in the western world is mainly capitalist and often, people act as individuals and do not take responsibility for others.
