The inspector does a final speech near the end of the play; he highlights each characters role in Eva’s death. “But just remember this. One Eva Smith has gone- but there are millions and millions and million of Eva Smiths and John Smiths left with us, with their lives, their hope and ears, their suffering, and chance of happiness, all intertwined with our lives, with what we think and say and do. We don’t live alone. We are members of one body. We are responsible for each other. And tell you that the time with soon come when, if man will not learn that lesson, then they will be, taught it in fire and blood and anguish.” By this quote, Priestly is trying to communicate through the inspector, saying that there are millions of innocent poor working class people that need help and not be divided into different classes, we should be equal. This ties in with the historical background because people were separated into the upper class, middle class or the working class. The upper class were a group of people who were at the top of the social hierarchy. They didn’t have to work for a living as they were supported by earned or inherited investments. They had more power over the less rich. On the other hand the middle class are people who were never at the top or the bottom of the social hierarchy. They were less wealthy than the upper class. Then there was the working class, who were often contrasted with the middle and upper class people. They were the social class and had to rely on their wages for their labour to survive.
Priestly also talks about the Suffragettes. The suffragettes wanted the right for woman to vote and get the same equality as the men did. In the 19th century, many women campaigned peacefully for the right to vote. They organised themselves into groups, held meetings, sent petitions to parliament and tried to persuade MP’s to change the law to enable them to vote. Later on, small group of women united with other groups building a large group called The National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies (NUWSS). However the government continued to ignore the activities of the NUWSS and this resulted in violence such as burning down churches, vandalised property and shouted abused to parliament. This is why the inspector said “we are responsible for each other and I tell you that the time will soon come when if men will not learn that lesson, then they will be taught it in fire and blood and anguish”. The final speech is related to the historical side, such as the 2 world wars. This is also significant to the audience as we have lived through both world wars and are seeing that the inspector is trying to refer to the wars and suffragettes ect, and is communicating the fact that we can stop or prevent these things from happening. Priestly didn’t just write the play just to express his views and opinions on socialist and capitalists but to show his views on class struggle altogether, that everyone should be treated equally. To an audience, it shows it’s not right to segregate people. We are all equal, if no effort for equality happens then it will turn to violence.
The Inspector’s speech has persuasive features to create effect; he repeats the word “millions” three times to emphasis how many working classes there are out in the world. He also uses cluster of three’s such as “Fire blood and anguish”, “think say and do” to build and effective ending. These are aimed at the Birling family, particularly make them realise that the world does not revolve around them.
Tension is also build by dramatic entrances and exits. At the beginning of at three Eric enters after the discussion of his involvement with Eva Smith. The stage direction state “Exactly as at the end of Act Two, Eric is standing just inside the room and the others are staring at him”. Eric’s entrance suddenly makes us assume that he is going do say or do something by the other characters reactions. Tension slowly rises as the characters look at Eric waiting for a response. He suddenly adds a line to the situation “You know don’t you?” Tension creeps up further as the audience want to know what the family know about Eric’s and Eva’s relationship. There’s a break after the second scene and the audience are wondering what’s Eric’s affairs with Eva; this has increased the tension scale. In other areas of the play, Gerald’s return after the inspector’s integrations with the Birlings is written in a clever way. The door rings and both the Birlings and audience are nervous about who it is. Mr Birling offers to get the door but Mrs Birling answers by letting Edna opening it. Again the audience tension increases. Gerald’s enters and the audiences tension scale decreases which has been built up during the long process of answering the door.
At the start of the play Priestly describes the light as “pink and intimate” so the scene is relaxed and comfortable. It stays like that until the inspector’s accusing and interrogation “Until the inspector arrives, and then it should be brighter and harder.” This breaks the relaxing world of the Birling Family.
Near the end of the play, Gerald and the Birling discuss interrogation, whether he is a hoax. Gerald “But the point is - this sergeant was dead certain they hadn’t any inspector at all like the chap who came here.” Birling “(excitedly) By Jingo! A fake!” the audience tension starts to lighten. They are still discussing the suspicious inspector and through out this, the audience’s tension eases. To rest the case of the “Fake” inspector he rings the police station to get some proof of existence of the inspector. “We rather worried about one of our employees. Have you had a girl brought in this afternoon who committed suicide by drinking disinfectant – or any like suicide? Yes, I’ll wait” both the audience and Birlings are nervous about Gerald’s answer. “No girl has died in there today”. Again the Birlings and audience nervousness go away. Suddenly as soon as Birling mentions that the two miners cannot take a joke, “the telephone rings sharply, there is a moment silence. Birling goes to answer it.” As the phone rang it pierced the comfortable world of Birlings, Then Birling talks in a panic stricken fashion at the others “that was the police. A girl has died - on her way to the infirmary - after swallowing some disinfectant.” Again the Birlings world has been disturbed. By this priestly wanted to show to his audience the Birlings were wrong and their attitude was rude. They were to into the theme of capitalists and didn’t show any care for the people surrounding them.
Each characters personality can be analysed by their stage direction; Arthur Birling is a heavy looking, rather portentous man but has provincial in his speech. “(Noticing that his wife has not taken any)” he takes interest of his wife not drinking. This shows that he only cares about his close relations. In his speeches “(confidentially)”, this shows that’s he’s confident and especially shows that he is above the rest and he’s proud of it. Birling also doesn’t like things out of the ordinary such as when inspector begins to interrogate the Birlings, “(Somewhat impatiently)”, this shows he is an impatient man and likes thing to go his way. Then there’s Mrs Birling seems to be always smiling before she talks, “(Smiling)”, this indicates she’s a pretentious character. Mrs Birling also like things to go her way, “(rebuking them): I’m talking to the inspector now, if you don’t mind. (To inspector, rather grandly)” this shows that she’s a critical character and again pretentious. Sheila is a sensitive character, (Enter SHEILA, who looks as if she’s been crying) but she tends to hold herself as the innocent and happy one out of the family (SHEILA has now entered) Shelia: (gaily) “What’s this about the streets? (Noticing the Inspector) Oh – sorry. I didn’t know.”
Eric the youngest child of the Birling family, he is half shy and half assertive, (who is uneasy, sharply) this shows he tries to justify his position in a confident way. Eric’s attitude towards the inspector seems to be uncomfortable, (suddenly bursting out) and (uneasily), this shows that Eric is a hidden character and is trying to hide something from the Inspector. Gerald’s stage directions show he is a sarcastic character but has an innocent tone, Gerald (lightly): sure to be. Unless Eric’s been up to something. (Nodding confidentially to Birling) And that would be awkward, wouldn’t it?” this shows he likes to put those in an awkward situation and knows he gets away with it because he is well-bred young man-about-town.
The inspector’s character seems to have control over each character. Every time he interrogates a character he knows when to handle the situation for example when interrogating Sheila owns up for her part in Eva’s death and changes though out the play, her feelings have been broken down and then she tried to portray herself as an innocent person but at the same time she knew she was in the wrong. This has happened by the inspector interrogation. These ties in with the historical and social background by Sheila realising that there’s others like Eva in the world and Mr and Mrs Birling trying to ignore it. This also relates with the Suffragettes as they did not get equal rights like Eva didn’t.
The cliff hanger in this play breaks the peak of the tension scale. For example when the phones rings at the end of act 3 and they find out about Eva actually died, the whole play starts over again by an inspector coming to interrogate. The twist at the end shocked the audience as they found out that Eva smith wasn’t dead from the first place but find out that she is. This long process of the Inspector interrogating has made the audience realise about the messages that Priestly is trying to give. As the inspector wasn’t a real one, I suggest that he was a spirit because his name means “spirit of death”, and he was the spirit of Eva’s death. He could be Eva’s guardian angel.
In conclusion tension created in Act 3 has been created by the characters use of language and stage exits and entrances for example when Eric returned just in time for the inspector to interrogate him and how it connected to his mother story. Priestly adding a final suspension to the play; which was the phone ring at the end made it a really good cliff hanger. If it were to be put on stage production and to create dramatic tension, they would have to bring the characters out from the book and portray their personalities. By using dramatic entrances and exit in the right places would create tension for instance Eric’s entrance. The actor who plays the inspector would have to be confident but blunt, manipulative and show no emotion. By this, this will create tension as the audience would want to know who the inspector is. Finally I think that Priestly’s play was a smart way of portraying the socialism, capitalism and politics in the world.
