One of the methods the inspector uses to reinforce J.B.Priestley’s message of the play is the way that the inspector repeatedly comments and reminds us of the horrible ordeals Eva Smith went through. “Burnt her insides out of course” The inspector here emphasises the point that Eva died in “great agony”.
There were so many unlucky things that happened to Eva and the inspector, again, always emphasises what bad luck it was and then how he managed to pick herself up and keep on going. “So after that two months, with no work, no money coming in… lonely, half starved, she was feeling desperate” and the inspector comments on how she pulled herself together “So that gave her the chance… she enjoyed being among the pretty clothes… she felt she was making a new, fresh start”
This allows the Birlings and the audience to create sympathy with Eva, helping them to realise what it was like for a working class woman to succeed in society.
The inspector also helps to create some admiration for Eva, so the audience know that she wasn’t just a sad, depressed woman, but that she actually had strong moral values, which makes her seem more real. “She went to your mother’s committee for help… and your mother refused her help”. Here he is saying that after all the blows that she suffered, she still had the courage, in the end to go to a charity for help, she needed that help because she would not take any more stolen money “so she had come to you for assistance because she didn’t want to take any more stolen money?” This makes us admire her, because she was that desperate, she went to a charity for help, but she refused money from Eric.
After Eva had finished with Gerald, we are told that she went to a seaside resort “to make it last longer” and she felt “ that there would never be any thing as good for her ever again”. This shows the audience that she was a smart, down-to-earth girl, who knew her position in society and realised that she would never have anything as good for her ever again, so she went to ‘savour the moment’
The inspector uses an individual character, Eva Smith, to represent a social group so that Priestley’s message becomes clearer to the audience. The inspector is always commenting on the poor conditions that Eva and other working class people have to live with. “There are a lot of young women living that sort of existence in every city and big town in this country” this warms the hearts of the audience, so they feel what it is like for the working class, and sympathy is created.
There is a lot of sympathy created for the working class in the play. Sheila and Eric do not agree with the pay the working class receive and the way they are treated. When Birling refused them a pay rise, he told them “It’s a free country” Eric replies and says “It isn’t if you can’t go and work somewhere else” This shows that Eric is more in touch with the different tiers in society, than Mr. Birling, who is old-fashioned and set in his ways. This also gives the audience a clearer picture of how hard it was to get a job, which creates sympathy among them. The Inspector tells Gerald and Birling than it is “better to ask for the world than to take it” which shows that the Inspector believes that Eva and her group were right to ask for a pay rise and should not have been punished for it.
Sympathy is also created when the Inspector suggests “putting ourselves in the place of these young women” because the audience immediately picture hungry, starving girls in their “dingy little back bedrooms”, “counting their pennies” and they couldn’t imagine having to live their life. Again Sheila and Eric realise that businesses abuse the working class “but these girls aren’t cheap labour, they’re people” Inspector Goole leads Sheila and Eric into saying such things. He ‘spoon-feeds’ them so he receives the response he wants, so he can build up a force against Birling. This creates sympathy, as Birling was the one that was ‘abusing’ the working class in the first place so the audience realise that everybody is ganging up on him. All through the little speeches made by the inspector about the working class, Mr. Birling is very quiet and is obviously taking it all in, and maybe secretly taking note in order to mend his ways. The audience will se Birling on stage, very quiet, and again will sympathise with the working class as they see him thinking about it and considering, possibly, how low their quality of life was.
Another tactic Priestley employs to convey his message through the inspector is the way he convinces Mrs Birling and Sheila to answer his questions.
Sheila is very ready with her answers, lets everything spill out naturally, and in fact delivers a long speech about her visit to Milwards and she even goes to the trouble of trying to remember name of her assistant “Miss Francis”. Sheila is very honest about the way she behaved “I was very rude to both of them” and is clearly very sorry for what she did “I’ll never, never do it again”. The inspector wasn’t to harsh with Sheila, he wasn’t as nasty with her as he was with the rest of the characters, probably because he knew that Sheila was regretting what she did, and was truly sorry for her actions.
Mrs Birling, on the other hand was much more awkward in questioning “and what if I was?” She would not give the inspector a straight answer to his questions and the inspector was getting quite angry “(severely) Do you want me to tell you – in plain words?” The inspector has to repeat his question several times before she would answer, “what did she reply to that…what was it…I’m losing all patience with you people, WHAT DID SHE SAY?” As the inspector becomes increasingly annoyed, he starts to lead her into landing all the blame onto Eric, with Mrs Birling not knowing. The inspector is crueller to Mrs Birling than to any other character. Sheila says he is “giving us the rope so that we will hang ourselves” This is exactly what he is doing with Mrs Birling, allowing her to dig herself deeper and deeper into the ground, without her realising until irreparable damage had been done. “So, who’s the chief culprit then?” Mrs Birling starts to blame Eric… “I blame the young man who was the father” Then she says that this young man should be “made an example of” she is now adamant that it was this boys fault and “ought to be dealt with very severely” Then the inspector breaks the news to Mrs Birling, not in a kind way at all. He was very cruel. “We know what to do don’t we? Mrs Birling has just told us.”
This illustrates the message again, Sheila, who was very co-operative got off rather lightly, but Mrs Birling, who was not in the least co-operative and seemed none the wiser at the end of the interrogation, had a cruel trick played on her, and she was taught her lesson in “fire and anguish”
I think that J.B.Priestley has used Inspector Goole to great effect in this play. He has allowed the inspector to act as a vehicle to convey his message about concern for people in the community. The play has made me realise that every decision I make, will affect somebody else’s life, so I must make sure it is the right one. If J.B.Priestley has managed to convey his message by somebody merely reading the play, he must have achieved his goal of conveying his message.
