Inspector Calls

The character Mr Birling in ‘An Inspector Calls’ by J.B Priestley is a greedy, arrogant and selfish ‘hardheaded businessman’, father of two, Sheila Birling and Eric Birling. Through Mr Birling Priestley shows what upper middle-class men were like in 1912. I believe Priestley set the play in 1912 and first performed it in 1946 because this date represented an era where everything was different. In 1912 there was a strict class system and gender roles, Priestley took the chance the end of the war had given them to create a different, more equal society.

An Inspector Calls is a three-act drama, which takes place on a single night in 1912, and focuses on the Birling family, who live in a wealthy but not particulary homely house in Brumley. The story begins when the mysterious Inspector Goole calls unexpectedly on the prosperous Birling family. The idea of the play, and particularly the role of the inspector, is to try to bring the Birling family to understand that they have a moral responsibility for the death of Eva Smith, if not a legal one. In Act Three, the Inspector tells the Birling family: “The girl killed herself and died a horrible death. But each of you helped to kill her. Remember that. Never forget it.” But who was really the

The inspector shows another side to Sheila’s character, her gentle side. Perhaps Sheila can be separated from the rest of the family because; she is the only one, apart from Eric who is able to accept responsibility for her actions. Also, when Gerald’s affair is revealed, Sheila is expected by her parents to forgive his behaviour and carry on as though nothing had happened. Sheila disagrees and returns her engagement ring. This shows how much Sheila changed from her old self.

Despite Gerald’s control over his fiancé Sheila seems more interested in the ring.Preistley may have been attempting to present the shallowness of the upper class society.

When Priestley wrote ‘An Inspector Calls’, It was 1946 but the play was set in 1912 between these dates 2 world wars had happened, a attempted pan-European genocide of the Jewish race, a massive economic crash, War had been brought to a new level with wars now affecting civilians with the use of

Some of the prologue has tragedy, other parts have betrayal and anger and one part of the prologue there’s a lot of tension. The conflicts between jennie and stephanie near the end of the play get’s really rough. Jennie

Inspector calls is a play written by the author J.B priestly. Set in 1912, but performed in 1945, after 2 world wars, this play evolves around the suicide of a pregnant working-class girl whose name is Eva smith. An inspector by the name of Goole, questions the involvement of a family business with the name Birling. Co and its upper-class owners. Priestly, being a socialist, writes this play to prevent a social divide between classes.

However, the ignorant side of Miss Brill can be seen as she deludes herself by stating that “No doubt somebody would have noticed if she hadn’t been there; she was part of the performance after all” (Mansfield 3). She deceives herself by stating that she is part of something greater: a grand play. She raises herself higher and higher in importance only to fall from grace at the end. This denial of the truth is what emphasizes the fact that she too is part of the old age which is exiled by society. This idea is further supported as Miss Brill views the young couple replace the old couple in her “special seat”. This exchange symbolizes the constant cycle which occurs between youth and old age. As the old become brittle and useless, the youth of the time will replace them. However, Miss Brill has still not realized that she is part of the elderly

‘An inspector call’ is a play set right before the World War I, and it allows people to think about their responsibility to the society by using different characters of different age groups. The young generation like Eric and Shelia has a contrasting perspective to the old generation which can be seen as Mr. Birling and Mrs. Birling, who won’t take the responsibility to the society.

In act one of David Adjmi’s play the character’s Lily and her friends are seen as materialistic children who care little about other’s lives and the real world, than themselves. It is learned here that the girl’s real goals in life revolve around the idea of getting married and having children. It is seen as Claudia who is nineteen and one of Lily’s friend’s

"The novel begins when the knockout Miss Wonderly walks into Spade's office. It turns out she's a knockout with money. And she wants to hire the services of a private detective to find her missing sister, who supposedly ran off with a crook named Thursby.

In this essay I will discuss why Priestley’s play ‘An Inspector Calls’ is effective, focusing on characterisation, dramatic devices and themes.

Her belief in her own importance in this play is displayed in her statement, “No doubt somebody would have noticed if she hadn’t been there; she was a part of the performance after all.”(51) This sentence begins the transition of the reader’s view of Miss Brill. There is a touch of foreshadowing in her imagined statement to the old man that she reads to; “Yes, I have been an actress for a long time.”(52) This statement causes the reader to wonder how much of what came before was real and how much was fantasy. Early in the story Miss Brill lets us know that she feels she is different from the other regulars in the park when she thinks of them: “They were odd, silent, nearly all old, and from the way they stared they looked as though they’d just come from dark little rooms or even-even cupboards!”(51) In the final paragraph, Miss Brill sees herself going “into the little dark room—her room like a cupboard”(52) and this is when she realizes that she is no different than the other old people in the gardens. The catalyst for this transition comes from the overheard conversation between the young couple that sits on her bench. When the young girl rebukes his advances and the boy asks, “But why? Because of that stupid old thing at the end there?” “ Why does she come here at all—who wants her? Why doesn’t she keep her silly old mug at home?” These statements shatter her fantasy and her fears are realized as she sees herself as

In his play ‘An inspector calls’, J.B Priestley uses the inspector to put across his critical views of society, these are inequality between classes, genders and wealth. Priestley also presents the inspector in a godly manner. The inspector is presented mysteriously and he has many role and functions like to make the audience question their own actions, to show the audience what Priestley thinks of society and to teach us about inequality between classes and genders.

In Diamond’s work, on the other hand, the characters introduce themselves and the setting of the story, even narrating their feelings later on. By having the characters address the audience directly and describe the setting of the story at the beginning, Diamond successfully redefines the characters and their arguments and proclamations as communicative devices that convey the message of the play to the audience. This reframing of characters externalizes their sentiments and leaves little room for audience interpretation. For example, while a “familiar violence rose” (Morrison 108) in Claudia in the novel, she expresses to the audience an “urge to squash” the little girl and “perform the same ritual” she “performed on” her “white dolls” (Diamond 56) in the play. In so reframing her characters, Diamond leaves little room for interpretation while creating an appropriate emotional distance between the audience and the characters, as the sentiments and messages of the characters are explicitly communicated to the audience are audience members are prevented from completely identifying with the characters, preserving the status of Diamond’s work as more social commentary than true story-telling.