Overview

• An Inspector Calls was written by J.B. Priestley


  1945
• Real time


  No change in time or location between acts
• An Inspector Calls


  • Set in an English manufacturing town called Brumley in 1912
  • Has 3 acts
  • Upper-middle class Birling family are visited by a mysterious inspector
• Act 1


  • Arthur, Sybil, Eric, and Sheila Birling, along with Gerald Croft, are having a dinner to celebrate the engagement of Sheila to Gerald
  • A police inspector, Inspector Goole, calls and asks to speak to Mr Birling about the death of a young woman, Eva Smith
  • Two years ago, Mr Birling fired Eva after she led a strike at his factory
  • Eva then got a job at Milward's but was fired again after Sheila complained about her
  • The Inspector reveals that Eva changed her name to Daisy Renton, and Gerald gives himself away by recognising the name
• Act 2


  • Gerald is forced to admit to his affair with Daisy Renton
  • The Inspector questions Mrs Birling about a case she presided over at the 'Brumley Women's Charity Organisation' where she refused help to a young, pregnant woman who introduced herself as 'Mrs Birling'
  • The family realise the father in question is Eric
• Act 3


  • Eric returns and admits to drinking heavily and acting aggressively towards Eva to get her to sleep with him, using money from his father's company's accounts to support her
  • The Inspector loses his patience with the Birlings and tells them they should never forget what they did
  • The family argue amongst themselves and figure out the Inspector wasn't a 'real' police investigator after all, and no girl died tonight
  • Sheila and Eric believe they should all learn from the Inspector's visit, while the others dismiss any guilt or remorse
• The play opens in the dining room of a suburban house belonging to Arthur Birling, a successful manufacturer, and his family
• The family are seated around the dining room table, celebrating the engagement of Sheila Birling to Gerald Croft, the son of another manufacturer
• Mr Birling starts to give a speech, noting that Gerald's parents couldn't attend, and goes on to say how much the engagement means to him
• Mr Birling tells Gerald that he knows Lady Croft, Gerald's mother, doesn't approve of the Birlings' social standing, but he believes he is in with a chance of being knighted
• Mr Birling lectures the young men on women and the duty of men to care for themselves and their families
• Mr Birling rejects any talk of "community", and tells them to do the same
• Mr Birling: '"In twenty or thirty years' time - let's say, in 1940 - you may be giving a little party like this [...] - and I tell you, by that time you'll be living in a world that'll have forgotten all these Capital versus Labour agitations and all these silly little war scares."'
• Mr Birling: '"We can't let these Bernard Shaws and H.G. Wellses do all the talking."'
• Mr Birling: '"But the way some of these cranks talk and write now, you'd think everybody has to look after everybody else."'
• Mr Birling: '"The Titanic - she sails next week - forty-six thousand eight hundred tons - forty-six thousand eight hundred tons - New York in five days - and every luxury - and unsinkable, absolutely unsinkable."'
• Mr Birling: '"A man has to make his own way - has to look after himself - and his family, too, of course, when he has one - and so long as he does that he won't come to much harm. But the way some of these cranks talk and write now, you'd think everybody has to look after everybody else, as if we were all mixed up together like bees in a hive - community and all that nonsense."'
• "like bees in a hive": 'Animalistic, attempting to portray Socialism as primitive and demeaning'
• Structure of the first part of Act 1

  • Mr Birling and Gerald are the first to speak, proving them to be the dominant male figures - until the Inspector arrives
  • Mr Birling's first line of dialogue is directed to Gerald, as he attempts to impress him, introducing Gerald as a socially-superior character and Mr Birling as one who is concerned with his social status
  • When Sheila first speaks, she is "possessive" and hints at the "jealousy" that leads her to complain about Eva
  • Mrs Birling hesitantly agrees to drink before giving the maid an order, enforcing her "coldness"
  • Eric participates very late into the conversation - and when he does so, it is with an awkward "guffaw"
• Priestley uses this first scene to very skilfully introduce all the themes and conflicts of the play
• Sheila reminds Gerald of "last summer, when you never came near me"


  Suggesting there are secrets between the happy couple
• Sheila accuses Eric of being "skiffy"


  Foreshadowing his drinking problem
• Mrs Birling's belief in social etiquette


  She is critical of "the things you girls pick up these days!" and tells Mr Birling "you're not supposed to say such things"
• Mr Birling's speech and time alone with Gerald


  He uses it to improve his social standing, hoping the engagement will bring Birling and Company and Crofts Limited "together" and informing Gerald of his possible "knighthood"
• The audience quickly get the impression that the engagement is a business decision rather than an act of love
• The first part of this Act is hugely dominated by Mr Birling
• Priestley is giving his audience a glimpse at the Capitalist, upper class world of the 1910s
• Mr Birling's power at the beginning of the play

  It is a symbol for Capitalism's influence at the start of the century
• Mr Birling's downfall with the arrival of the Inspector


  It carries a message about how Capitalism will fare against Socialism
• A ring at the door interrupts Mr Birling
• The maid, Edna, tells them an inspector has called and is asking to speak to Mr Birling
• Mr Birling and Gerald joke that Eric is in trouble
• The inspector is introduced as Inspector Goole
• Mr Birling's assumption about why the Inspector wants to speak to him


  He assumes it is because he is still a magistrate in the city
• The Inspector corrects him, explaining that a girl died of suicide at the Infirmiary after drinking disinfectant
• The men are shocked, but Mr Birling doesn't understand why it's relevant to him
• The Inspector tells them her name was Eva Smith
• Mr Birling says the name doesn't mean anything to him
• The Inspector reveals she was employed at his works at one time, and shows him a photograph of her that prompts Mr Birling's memory
• Mr Birling recounts how Eva Smith and some other factory workers demanded a higher wage, and went on strike when they weren't given it