An essay on the character of Eric Birling on how he behaves and acts throughout the playwright, written by J.B Priestley. This essay is marked against an Eduqas mark scheme but the skills are transferable to an AQA mark scheme.
How is Eric Birling presented in An Inspector Calls?
J.B Priestley presents the character of Eric Birling in his play 'Inspector Calls', set in 1912. He is first
introduced as quite a secretive person who doesn't share much with the people who he has spent his
entire life with but when the plot unfolds, the audience and the characters learn of his sins and his grave
involvement with Eva Smith/Daisy Renton.
Eric is established as someone who is not comfortable in his position suggested in the stage directions in
act 1: 'not quite at ease, half shy, half assertive'. This could convey that he lacks confidence or he is
awkward and unsure of himself. However, this discomfort could root towards his family's lifestyle and
privileges as perhaps he thinks this wealthy life of his does not suit him. It foreshadows his attitude
throughout the play; he is not quite at ease with the other characters' behaviour nor his own. Priestley
sows the seed of doubt in the audience as we don't know an obvious sign to why he would be acting this
way with his family.
However, we finally get a picture of where he stands regarding his ideologies and views when he
challenged his own father using the question 'Why shouldn't they try for higher wages?' after Birling
expresses that he wants to raise the prices of his products. Here, it is now clear that Eric is able to
sympathise with the lower classes and recognise the need for better workplace rights unlike Mr Birling.
Furthermore, it presents Eric in a sympathetic light through his opposition of Mr Birling's views and
demonstrates that he is the moral superior during the conversation between himself, his father and
Gerald. This is a critique of the hypocrisy of capitalism by Priestley in the form of Eric, to strive for a
socialist view, something which the audience should align themselves with.
In act three, after the interrogations of the other characters, we finally learn of his entanglement with
Eva: that Eric had gone to the Palace Bar, to then meet her which ended up getting Eva pregnant. He
explains or almost excuses it by saying 'I was in that state when a chap easily turns nasty', the
euphemistic phrase is used as a substitute for Eric's admittance of being drunk. In addition, Eric
addresses himself in third-person, 'when a chap', which disassociates himself from his unforgivable
actions. The audience may feel downhearted because it suggests that Eric is trivialising the situation to
seem that he doesn't feel guilty to a greater extent than he should be.
This point is validated later on when he describes Eva as 'pretty and a good sport'. The noun 'sport' says
that he sees Eva as something to do in the meantime; it correlates to hunting where Eric is the supposed
predator and Eva is the prey. On the other hand, we know that this is normalised behaviour among high-
class men in society, using prostitutes as they pleased, which arguably justifies his immoral actions - he is
simply following in the footsteps of other men. Other men such as Birling's friends, which he uses as an
excuse by comparing his exploitation of Eva to them. He insinuates that the alcohol-fuelled violence is a
state familiar to all me and therefore acceptable.
Later on, the audience is taught that his lack of parenting he was given may have been the cause with
the amount of secrets he has kept. Eric angrily tells his father 'you're not the kind of father a chap could
go to when he's in trouble'. 'Kind of father' tells us that he knows of the different parenting styles but he
does know that Birling is not the ideal guardian or head of a family as a father figure. This overall
heightens the audience's feeling of sympathy towards him since he has not been given the proper
attention and care growing up.
In conclusion, Eric is used by Priestley to show that a product of poor parenting from individualistic and
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