This document includes the quotes and analysis for the characters of Mr and Mrs Birling used by my students to achieve a grade 9 in their English literature GCSE. Each point includes contextual information to support it.
Mr Birling and Mrs Birling - grade 9 character analysis and quotes
- “like bees in a hive” – through this simile, Mr Birling compares the idea of a
socialist society to “bees” who are bunched together in their beehive.
Although this image is not necessarily a bad one to most people, Mr Birling
sees it as restrictive and almost limiting as he describes it as “trapped”.
Through showing the disturbance Mr Birling sees in a socialist society, he
shows just how immoral and thoughtless those at the top of a capitalist society
are to the point the of ideas of working together and caring for each other (the
core values of socialism) feeling restrictive due to the fact that he is unable to
succeed economically and feel superior to others. Moreover, bees are known
to connote teamwork and working diligently for a common goal (honey).
Therefore, by comparing socialism to “bees in a hive”, Priestley alludes to the
benefits of a socialist society where there are no distinct class divisions
separating people and everyone is treated equally, which would essentially
diminish the inequality of wealth during the Edwardian era
- “unsinkable, absolutely unsinkable” – Priestley employs a sense of irony as
the play was written in 1945 after the sinking of the titanic. Through this irony,
Priestley presents Mr Birling as foolish to an extent to show how unsuitable
people like him are to ruling society, allowing him to criticise the old, upper-
class men who held control over Edwardian society. Moreover, through the
use of the adverb “absolutely”, it shows Mr Birling’s complete certainty in his
predictions, perhaps as a way to not only highlight his extreme arrogance but
also to hint at the older generations’ inability to change their outdated views,
further allowing Priestley to convey his message that the younger generations
bring hope and a possibility of change.
- “if you don’t come down sharply on some of these people, soon they’d soon
be asking for the earth” – Mr Birling describing how he came down on Eva
Smith acts as a euphemism for how he fired her for asking for higher pay. The
use of the euphemism here almost suggests how little he cares about doing
this as he prioritises the profit of his business over the lives of people in the
lower classes e.g. Eva Smith. Moreover, he compares Eva Smith simply asking
for a raise in pay to her “asking for the earth”, showing just how abhorrently
women in the working class were exploited due to them being seen as
expendable (Context: although more women were employed after WW2
employers took advantage of this and paid them less for their labour). On top
of this, Mr Birling also generalises the working class through the phrase “these
people”, showing the audience how he sees the lower classes as a group as
opposed to individuals. This allows Priestley to convey how the upper class saw
people from the lower classes as expendable, cheap labour as opposed to
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