inspector calls quotes and characters

• Priestly


  A socialist who wrote the play to criticize the capitalist Edwardian system
• Women in Edwardian England

  • Had very few rights, needed the protection of marriage and a husband to guarantee stability
  • Did not receive equal pay
• Edwardian England


  Time of deep class divisions, with the upper and upper-middle classes having disproportionate power which they used to exploit the working classes
• Undeserving poor


  Prevailing view that the poor were somehow immoral and undeserving of aid and charity
• An Inspector Calls is set just before the start of World War One, in 1912</b>
• Main themes in An Inspector Calls

  • Class
  • Age
  • Social responsibility
  • Gender
• Class theme


  Priestley wanted to illustrate the deep class divisions and how the upper and upper-middle classes abused their power
• Age theme


  Priestley was pessimistic about the older generation and felt that social change towards equality would be driven by the younger generation
• Social responsibility theme


  Priestley wanted to illustrate that the wealthy had a duty, not a choice, to use their money and resources to help the poor
• Gender theme


  Priestley used the female characters to illustrate the lack of power and mistreatment of women
• Mr. Birling: 'The Titanic, unsinkable, absolutely unsinkable'
• Mr. Birling: 'It's my duty to keep labor costs down'
• Mr. Birling: 'The younger generation who know it all'
• Sheila Birling: 'These girls aren't cheap labor but we can see here that she actually she is quite Humane'
• Sheila Birling: 'I started it'
• Sheila Birling: 'There's nothing to be sorry for, nothing to learn here'
• Gerald Croft: 'We're respectable citizens and not criminals'
• Gerald Croft: 'I became the most important person in her life'
• Gerald Croft: 'You know, girl, and then he mentions four or five different girls'
• Mrs. Birling: 'Girls of that class'
• Mrs. Birling: 'She'd improperly made use of our name'
• Mrs. Birling: 'You might be wanting to help him instead of us'
• Eric Birling: 'I don't remember... that's the hellish thing'
• Eric Birling: 'You lot'
• Inspector Goole: 'A young woman died... she was in great agony'
• Inspector Goole: 'Public men... have responsibilities'
• Inspector Goole: 'Millions and millions and millions of Eva Smiths and John Smiths'