He isn’t afraid of Mr Birling’s, as many policemen in those times would have been, because Mr Birling has such a high position.
We don’t know if the letter, diary, or name change is true or even if it is the same photo he shows to the other characters. He has a good hold over the family and they admit more than they need to.
Priestly manipulates our sense of what we expect in a policeman/investigator as he makes Inspector Goole act as how we would expect and policeman/investigator to behave. The range of his question often surprise the others as he makes judgement about their characters which they feel or unusual about in the police inspector. He destroys their belief that they are respectable citizens. All of them find this a shattering experience.
The characters, which resist telling the inspector the truth, suffer more than those whom are more open. The inspector says to Gerald, whom is one of them who refuse to tell the truth, ‘...if you’re easy with me, I’m easy with you.’ He makes no judgment upon Gerald, and he deliberately tries to stop Sheila from blaming herself too much. However, he begins to lose his patience with Mr Birling ‘don’t stammer and yammer at me again, man. I’m losing my patience with you people!’ Mrs Birling repels the truth the most, and the inspector is the harshest with her: ‘I think you did something terribly wrong…’
He’s also the voice of conscience for the family, as he forces them to think of the consequences of their actions on other people, (Eric: "He was our inspector alright"; Sheila: "He inspected us alright"). He helps each character acknowledge their guilt for Eva’s suicide, and to regret. Surprisingly, Inspector Goole neither forgives nor punishes. Each character is made to face that they must judge themselves; only then they have learned enough to change their ways.
The inspector brings out the things that the family have concealed i.e. how they became involved with Eva, how they behaved towards her, why Eric is always drunk, and what Gerald did last summer.
The Inspector persuades the characters to reveal all this will adds to the effect that he may already have known. The most remarkable example of the inspector’s ability to point out the untruth is when he accuses Mrs Birling of being a damn right liar.
The inspector is like the voice of conscience in the play for the viewers and also readers to consider Eva’s circumstance and that there is millions of Eva’s out there. He tries to show we have a responsibility to protect the ‘Eva’s Smiths’ of our society. The inspector shows the Birling’s their actions have consequences and they are responsible for looking after those less fortunate. The inspector shows the audience at the same time. He conveys the author’s message that we cannot avoid our social responsibilities.
At the same time the play was set, there was mass unemployment and social conditions were difficult for money where difficult or many. Eva Smith was a representative of many who found himslef or herself out of work and with nowhere to turn for help. Business owners had grown rich at the expense of exploited workers. Welfare at the time was sparse. Priestley wanted to teach society that such people are our responsibility the gets this message across through the inspector Eva’s situation. When he talks to the Birlings he is also talking to the audience, passing the playwrights message. In this way, the inspector acts as the voice of conscience for society.
At the end of the play they find out that he wasn’t a real policeman. Each character has different responses to it, Mr and Mrs Birling and Gerald, feel foolish for falling for such a trick and bemused that someone actually got them that worried. Sheila and Eric are still traumatised and in shock at what the other characters are saying like they learned nothing from what Inspector Goole was saying, and believes that they are the people that he said they were.
The audience, would be quite shocked and mystified about who the inspector really is and may also find it amusing that the characters fell for the ‘joke’.
I believe that Goole was actually a spirit messing around with the living minds, to make them see what horrid people they really are. I believe he is a ghost because of the hint in his name, (Goole play on for Ghoul), and how he knew a girl would commit suicide by drinking disinfectant. But I believe that he real identity will stay a mystery and many conflicts between people at what they believe he is.
Even though Preistley set the play, as it was realistic it actually is a fairy tale with a hidden lesson (moral). The audience in 1946 (the play is set in 1912) would have appreciated the truth of the inspector’s prophecy which was ‘if men will not learn that lesson then they will be taught in fire, blood and anguish ’.
