Inspector Goole’s name is an obvious pun on ‘ghoul’ a spirit or ghost. His mysterious and unusual character and name can give the audience an indication of Priestley’s presence within him. When the Inspector enters, onto the stage, “he creates at once an impression of massiveness, solidity and purposefulness”. The Inspector is used as a contrast to Birling. The timing of the Inspector’s entrance is a crucial feature of the play. It turns all of Birling’s views and beliefs upside down. Birling is stating “a man has to mind his own business and look after himself and his own-“until he is interrupted by the front door bell. This is when the Inspector enters. The Inspector then leaves the stage and story by challenging Mr. Birling’s philosophy of life “We are members of one body. We are responsible for each other”,”if men will not learn that lesson, then they will be taught it in fire and blood and anguish”. The play is set in a real-life household in real time. This impacts on the way the audience feels, as they think that what they are seeing is actually happening. Priestley uses dramatic irony to expose Birling’s poor judgments. As an audience from the future watching events set in 1912 we can see that Priestley has made Mr. Birling even more ridiculous by using dramatic irony; he says things that we know to be false. In doing this Priestley has helped us to discredit all Birling’s attitudes, not just his poor judgment “I say there isn’t a chance of war. The world is developing so fast that it will make war impossible”. He also mentions the Titanic as being “unsinkable”.
The Inspector is Priestley’s mouth piece to show his socialist views. The worst features of the upper class families seem to be present in the Birlings: they represent the worst qualities of their class. Priestley uses Birling to represent the factory owners; Eva is the stereotype of a weak and vulnerable working class girl. The Inspector is created to fight for her rights and others from her social class, now that she has gone. To show the differences between the attitudes of the social classes Priestley uses dialogue. Birling, being an arrogant and stubborn character, tries to defend himself against, what he thinks to be a public scandal, “Rubbish! If you don’t come down sharply on some of these people, they’d soon be asking for the Earth”. The Inspector replies “But after all it’s better to ask for the earth than to take it”. The two older Birlings have very different points of view about the social classes, compared to their children. Mr. Birling speaks to Eva in an impolite manner, simply due to the class that she is born into, he tells her to “clear out”. Mrs. Birling is also prejudiced against people of Eva’s class, “She was claiming elaborate fine feelings and scruples that were simply absurd in a girl in her position”. Mrs. Birling thinks that only people with money and power deserve scruples, unlike Eva Smith. Sheila and Eric change through the night and begin to realise what they have done and how this has affected a poor young lady. Sheila is willing to “help her know”. She almost instantly learns from her mistake “I’ll never, never do it again to anybody”.
The exposure of the Birling family has an influence to how Priestly conveys his message across to the audience. Priestley’s views are spoken by the Inspector. Sheila and Eric then echo these through the play; they speak the Inspector’s thoughts. To illustrate to the audience just how difficult and unfair life is for the weak and venerable in this society the Inspector paints a very clear image in our heads of Eva Smith “This afternoon a young lady drank some disinfectant, and died, after several hours of agony”. He emphasises that the woman was very pretty before he saw her in the horrid state at the infirmary. This makes Sheila feel more sympathetic “It’s just that I can’t help thinking about this girl- destroying herself so horribly- and I’ve been so happy tonight”. Priestley makes Eva the most unfortunate young lady of her class. Firstly, she is poor and uneducated, therefore dependant on people like Mr. Birling for a job which she looses for no fault of her own. Secondly, she is pregnant due to exploitation by an affluent middle class. The combination of her attractiveness and the misfortune, of not being born to the status which can protect her against such situations, means that she is the victim of Eric “I wasn’t in love with her or anything-but I liked her- she was pretty and a good sport”. Finally when she is defenceless and helpless to supply herself with money, she turns to charity and relies on the judgement of a woman such as Mrs. Birling to decide whether she should be helped or not, all Mrs. Birling has to say, “naturally that was one of the things that prejudiced me against her case”.
The parent’s morals contrast to their children’s by the end of the play. The older generation- Mr. and Mrs. Birling believe the way that they treat lower class people is the way that people, higher up on the social scale, such as them should treat them. However, the Inspector manages to change the younger generations, Eric’s and Sheila’s, lives and personality forever. Sheila and Eric have learned their lesson and they both confess to their actions and take on the responsibility, Sheila even says “I know I had her turned out of a job. I started it”. Sheila tries her best to signify the purpose of the inspector to the rest of her family, she wants them to realise that it no longer any concern to them who the inspector was “But don’t you see, if all that’s come out tonight is true, then it doesn’t much matter who it was who made us confess. And it was true wasn’t it?”. The play makes us question what type of character we would prefer. What we do to all the John and Eva Smiths out there. It also demonstrates that the older generation will not learn from their mistakes, our future depends on the younger generation. The reason why Priestley wrote this play to show the present older generation that they must learn from their mistakes, it is important that they do. The Inspector changes a couple of characters in the play, however does he mange to change the audience?
The Inspector is vital for the play, without him the play could not happen. The play describes the life story of Eva Smith; the Inspector provides the entire framework for this story by introducing all the stages and outcomes of these in her life. He elicits the information from the Birlings with some persuasion and even force, since Mr. and Mrs. Birling are reluctant to ‘confess’ their roles in Eva Smith’s tragic death. This produces all the detail of the play. The Inspector speaks with great moral authority, cutting short, interrupting and challenging people. The Inspector wants Birling to ‘confess’, “I’m not going until I know all that happened”. He controls the situation throughout, to the extent that he decides who will speak and when; who may or may not leave; who will or will not see the photograph “the Inspector interposes himself between them and the photograph”. Priestley shows the Inspector’s dominance, during much of the Inspector’s conversation, “I’ll explain why when you’ve answered my questions, Mrs. Birling”. He seems to have the power to make all the characters speak only when and what he wants them to. “Come along, Mr. Croft. What happened?
