Character and Theme in An Inspector Calls

1
Character and Theme in An Inspector Calls
2
Characters Overview

• Remember that the characters in the book are
  symbolic.
• Each of them represents a particular type or
  class.
• The one exception might be the Inspector.

3
Characters Overview 2

• One way of judging the characters is to look at
  the way they change, or dont change by the end
  of the play.
• Ask yourself are they different at the end?

4
Arthur Birling 1

• He is wealthy and middle-class with aims of
  becoming part of the upper class.
• Hopes to be knighted theres a fair chance that
  I might find my way into the next Honours List.
  P.8
• Former Lord-Mayor of Brumley and as such he is
  full of his own self-importance I was an
  alderman for years and Lord Mayor two years
  ago. p.11

5
Arthur Birling 2

• As a local magistrate he sees himself as being
  above the law. He thinks he can get away with
  things.
• In Act One he says he know the Chief Constable
  we play golf together sometimes p.16
• Look at his reaction when he thinks theyve
  rumbled the Inspector
• At the end of the play he is glad to have avoided
  a public scandal.

6
Arthur Birling 3

• He is totally unaware of the effects of his
  actions on other people.
• He doesnt care that there are low wages for
  workers. He celebrates ripping off his workers
  and cutomers lower costs and higher prices p.4

7
Arthur Birling 4

• He is totally unrealistic about the future.
• His speech about the Titanic calls it
  unsinkable, absolutely unsinkable. P.7
• He wrongly doesnt think there will be a war
  Therell be peace and prosperity and rapid
  progress everywhere. p.7

8
Sybil Birling

• She is a horrible snob and looks down on people
  with less money.
• She refuses Eva Smith money for just having the
  cheek to use the same name as her, calling it a
  piece of gross impertinence p.43
• She is also a hypocrite and judges lower classes
  more harshly than her own family.
• She calls (in a moment of dramatic irony) her own
  son a drunken young idler.

9
Gerald Croft

• Gerald is a real member of the upper classes, the
  son of Sir George Croft and Lady Croft.
• He is also quite weak and willing to do the easy
  thing. Look at how he sucks up to Birling I
  believe youre right Sir p.6, but also on page
  15 and 17.
• He is also a liar, he tells Sheila that he has
  been very busy at work when he has been having an
  affair.

10
Gerald Croft 2

• In the end he is very much concerned with his
  reputation above everything else.
• Look at his relief when he finds out the hospital
  has not got the body of a suicide victim.
• He believes that the most important thing is if
  the Inspector is a fake as that makes all the
  difference. p.63

11
Eric

• Eric is a party-boy, hard drinking (perhaps
  because he is miserable) and is portrayed as
  being the black sheep of the family.
• He is also a rebel, and tries to take on Mr
  Birlings selfish views. For example p.6 What
  about the war?

12
Eric 2

• Eric is one of the few characters who has managed
  to change because of the terrible experience of
  Eva Smith.
• He says it was tough luck that she was sacked,
  and shows sympathy for her tragic life.
• Later on he realises that the Inspector was
  showing them their own faults He was our police
  inspector all right p.59

13
Sheila

• Sheila is the character who works out the tragedy
  of Eva Smith most quickly.
• When she admits that she was at fault for having
  Eva fired from Milwards. She asks the Inspector
  if Im really responsible? p.23
• She also works out that Gerald has been up to no
  good. I expect youve done things youre
  ashamed of too. p.23

14
Sheila 2

• Sheila is sometimes called the conscience of
  the play, as she is one most troubled by Evas
  story.
• She appeals for the others to help the inspector.
  P.30
• At the end of the play she doesnt seem ready to
  take Gerald back. No. Not yet. Its too soon. I
  must think. p.72

15
Inspector Goole

• He is a character who doesnt, like others try to
  gloss over the truth. Sometimes he is described
  as blunt or direct.
• He outwits the family by isolating them, one
  line of inquiry at a time p.11
• He refuses to be intimidated by Birling. See the
  earlier golf scene, and also in Act Two when he
  refuses to apologise to Birling. Apologize for
  what doing my duty?

16
Inspector Goole 2

• Goole always tells it like it is and advances the
  political philosophy of the play.
• Look at dialogue in Act Two when he puts forward
  the idea that the rich should care for the poor.
  Public men, Mr Birling, have responsibilities as
  well as privileges. p.41

17
Inspector Goole 3

• The mystery of the Inspector is heightened by his
  name Goole. This technique is called
  nomenclature.
• When he disappears we are left with the question
  of who he was.
• Is he a vision from the past or future?
• In he representative of all of our consciences?

18
Themes Social Responsibility

• Social Responsibility
• J.B Priestley was a socialist and one of the big
  questions he is asking his audience is How
  should society be organised?
• He is offering us a choice between socialism in
  which the rich are compelled to share their
  wealth, or through capitalism where you are
  allowed to keep more of your money.

19
Social Responsibility 2

• The two different views of society are
  represented by Birling and the Inspector.
• The Inspector tells Birling that 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.
• Birling tells his family that everyone is on
  their own, A man has to make his own way has
  to look after himself. p.9

20
Social Responsibility 3

• The relationship between the working class and
  the rich is the way that Priestley explores the
  struggle between socialism and capitalism.
• Eva Smith is symbolic of the way that all workers
  are treated. The Inspector tells Eric that he
  used Eva like an animal, a thing, not a person.
  p.56

21
Social Responsibility 4

• The idea of the play is what happens to Eva Smith
  represents what happens to all poor workers.
• In his final speech the Inspector makes that
  obvious (p.56) One Eva Smith has gone - but
  there are millions and millions and millions of
  Eva Smiths and John Smiths still left with us,
  with their lives, their hopes and fears, their
  suffering and chance of happiness, all
  intertwined with our lives, and what we think and
  say and do.

22
Themes - Time

• Remember the play has two time frames that you
  have to remember.
• It is set in 1912 a time before the horror of
  World War One.
• BUT it was written in the Second World World War
  in 1945.
• Priestley is contrasting a very innocent time
  with a time of horror, bombing and mass killing.

23
Time 2

• Life in Britain in 1912
• Photo of a grocer shop in Twickenham 1912.
• In Britain it was a freezing winter with many
  dying from the cold. Things were made worse by
  coal, dock and transport strikes.
• March 1st - Window smashing rampage in Londons
  West end by Suffragettes. (Women who wanted equal
  rights)
• October 1st - First Balkan war - Turkey invaded
  by Bulgaria, Serbia, Greece and Montenegro.
• The class system was still prominent and the
  people at the top of society were massively
  wealthy compared to normal workers, and those
  workers often had very poor pay and conditions.
• There was also increasing competition with
  Germany and the USA for trade and the first
  rumblings of war were in the air.

24
Time 3

• Life in Britain in 1945
• Britain was wrecked by the Second World War.
  Major cities had been ravaged by fire after being
  attacked with incendiary bombs and London had
  been hit by the blitz.
• January 27th Soviet armies discover death camps
  in Nazi occupied territory.
• Feb 13th Allied planes firebomb Dresden killing
  over 25,000 people and destroying the city.
• August 6/9th - American attacks on Hiroshima and
  Nagasaki with nuclear weapons.
• The men and women who had fought the war had
  started to feel that they wanted a fairer society
  and wanted more rights. After the war the
  Welfare State was implemented offering all people
  the guarantee to free healthcare, education and a
  state pension for the first time.

25
Time 4

• Priestley was really interested in different
  theories about time and was very interested in a
  thinker called J.W Dunne. Dunne wrote a book
  suggesting that the same things might be
  happening simultaneously all the time.
• He believed that people who were specially
  trained could see backwards and forwards in time.
  Priestley thought that this might mean you
  could be warned by visitors from the future about
  how to behave.

26
Time 5

• However that wasnt the only odd belief that
  Priestley had.
• He also liked the ideas of a mystic called
  Ouspensky who pioneered a theory called eternal
  recurrence.
• His idea was that youd live your life over and
  over until youd made all of the right choices.
  This means that youd get the chance to avoid
  mistakes youd made before.

27
Gender/Age Conflict

• Look at the issues in the play
• Women used as possessions by men.
• Women dont have the same rights as their men.
• Youth versus Age is often highlighted, for
  example Eric vs Mr Birling.
• These issues highlight social changes to come in
  the future.

28
Character and Theme in An Inspector Callsby Mr
E. Monaghan, December 2011ewm_at_cokethorpe.org