The Role of the Inspector in an An Inspector Calls by J.B. Priestley

The Role of the Inspector in an An Inspector Calls by J.B. Priestley

All three acts, which are continuous, take place in the dinning room

of the Birlings' house in Brumley, an industrial city in the North

Midlands.

Mr Birling his wife Mrs Birling and his son Eric are celebrating the

engagement of his daughter Sheila and Gerald Croft. An Inspector calls

round to question the family on the death a girl called Eva Smith who

committed suicide by drinking strong disinfectant because she was very

depressed.

The author J.B.Priestley was born on September 13, 1894 Bradford, West

Yorkshire and died August 14, 1984 Stratford-Upon-Avon. Priestly was

educated at Cambridge University, and by the age of 30 had established

a reputation as a humorous writer and critic. His first major success

came with a novel, The Good Companions (1929), he became better known

as a dramatist. Without doubt, his best known play is An Inspector

Calls (1946).

He fought in WW2 and this experience had a lasting effect on him. The

play is set in 1912, only 2 years before the outbreak of WW1, and in

the inspectors' final speech he seems to hint at the trouble to

follow. "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 play deals with the issues raised by an elite society, represented

by the Birlings, possession of most of the wealth and power in the

country and at the expense of the majority of the poor people,

represented by Eva Smith.

I think that Priestley had quite strong socialist views which seem to

emerge in the voice of the inspector. At the ti...

... middle of paper ...

...the separate accounts

together to form an approximate biography of Eva Smith from when she

left the employment of Mr Birling up until she commits suicide.

Inspector Goole has another use though - he acts as a social

conscience of sorts. He acts as the voice of Priestley in the play, or

the voice of Priestley's socialist views. "We don't live alone. We are

members of one body. We are responsible for each other." He points out

that "we have to share something. If nothing else, we'll have to share

our guilt, and that "Public men Mr Birling, have responsibilities as

well as privileges" to which Arthur Birling replies "you weren't asked

here to talk to me about my responsibilities." Contrary to what Arthur

Birling believes, it is a very likely that the inspector was sent to

the Birlings to teach them about responsibilities.