Exam (elaborations)
GCSE AQA 'An Inspector Calls': Essay on Responsibility
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How successfully is the idea of (collective) responsibility explored in this play, through theuse of the Inspector?
Write about:
● Priestley’s ideas about (collective) responsibility in An Inspector Calls
● How Priestley uses the Inspector to present these views
Priestley’s prime motive in constructing the play ‘An Inspector Calls’ is to affect social
change and encourage the capitalists of post war Britain (society after the Second World
War) to show a collective responsibility to the lower classes and encourage people to be
responsibility towards other members of society. Priestley was very critical of capitalist
ideologies and helped to create the new labour party. He has socialist ideas that he wants to
convey to a middle class audience. Through the play, Priestley examines the morality of man
and extolls the importance of taking responsibility for one’s own actions and how this could
significantly influence another member of society. We see Priestley using the play as a
microcosm and the Birling family as social constructs who are used to represent different
sections of society. Through the central device of the Inspector, Priestley explores each
character’s contribution to the demise of Eva Smith.
Whilst all Birlings, according to the Inspector, have to accept some responsibility for the
death of Eva Smith, Birling, as the patriarch of the family and a man who represents
capitalism, triggers the chain reaction that begins Eva’s path of destruction. Prior to the
arrival of the Inspector, the audience witnesses Birling’s self-congratulatory speech as he
extolls the importance of individualism – a philosophy that is the opposite of being
responsible for other people in the community. Notably, Birling announces to the family that
‘a man has to mind his own business and look after himself and his own’. The use of the
noun phrase ‘his own business’ coupled with the pronoun ‘himself’ and ‘his own’ highlights
that Birling places his narrow responsibility on his family and fails to accept any responsibility
for his employees. This is an idea that Priestley seems to condemn. Additionally, we see
Birling mocking the ideas of socialists by dismissing them as ‘cranks’ and saying ‘as if we
were all mixed up together like bees in a hive’. This metaphorical notion is dismissed by
Birling as ‘nonsense’. This dismissal of community responsibility is revealed to the audience
through the treatment of Eva Smith; through the tragic portrayal of Eva’s struggle, through
the proxy of the Inspector, the audience is able to see how Birling’s failure to pay Eva a
decent wage because of his responsibility to family to maximise profits is greedy and unjust.
Eva, unlike Birling, takes responsibility for her worker by ‘demanding’ a higher wage and is
subsequently sacked for being a ‘ring-leader’. Birling’s justification is for this is that is his
‘duty to keep labour costs down’. Therefore, we witness, through his own admission that he
fails to take responsibility for his workers because his main aim is to maiximise his profits.
This therefore reminds the contemporary audience that he is a capitalist and a ‘hard-headed
man of business’ and the middle class audience can see the damage that this can inflict
upon society. We see when Eva shows leadership qualities, Birling fails to take responsibility
for her needs and talents, firing her because she threatens his profit margins.
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