How does Priestley explore responsibility in An Inspector Calls?
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The ideas about responsibility in An Inspector Calls
How Priestly presents these ideas by the way he writes
In Priestley’s allegorical play “An Inspector Calls”, he clearly explores his socialist beliefs about responsibility which directly contrasts with the patriarchal and capitalist views of the Edwardian era at the time. He expresses to the audience how he firmly believes that everyone should be responsible for their own behaviour and responsible for the welfare of others no matter what class they are a part of.
During the exposition of the play, Priestley uses Mr Birling to present the upper class as having strong capitalist beliefs where they thought that the idea of collective responsibility in society was useless and degraded their reputation if they adhered to it. In Act 1 Mr Birling acts as a microcosm for the capitalist ideologies of the upper class when he says, “As if were all mixed up together like bees in a hive - community and all that nonsense.”. Mr Birling likens the working class to bees, this direct comparison reflects Mr Birling's degradation and mockery of the concept of collective responsibility. For this, he becomes vilified for his rejection of the idea of collective responsibility, community, and his preference for materialism over human relationships. Additionally, the hyphen prompts a theoretical pause in the scene before articulating the word “community” to emphasise Mr Birlings' physical repulsion to the concept. In Act 1 Priestley also shows the audience how Mr Birling thought that the Titanic would be “unsinkable, absolutely unsinkable” Priestley uses dramatic irony here as the play was performed and written after the Titanic sunk warning them that Mr Birling's views are wrong even when he's so certain about it so they shouldn't accept his capitalist beliefs as well. The Titanic could symbolise the Birling family and how he believes that they themselves are unsinkable until the inspector arrives. Priestley may have done this to show how the upper class saw themselves as above the rest of society but in reality, their perceived success is as fragile as the Titanic.
As the play progresses, we see how the arrival of the Inspector and what he says has a great impact on Sheila as she switches from an upper class character who got Eva Smith fired from her job because her envy took over her to a young girl who takes on socialist views and stands up to her parents by describing how the working class women are “not cheap labour - they're people” The syntax of the noun “labour” before “people” reflects how sheila has realised that capitalists view the value of a person based off the amount of “labour” they provide rather than the worth of a person. Furthermore, the hyphen after the phrase “chap labour” emphasises her disgust at the disregard for the lower classes' humanity. Additionally, throughout the play, Priestley aligns members of the upper class with the seven deadly sins of Christianity. For example, Mr Birling represents greed, Sheila represents envy, Eric and Gerald represent lust, etc. This highlights to the audience how at the time the play was set the upper class had no regard for religion and morality, they were simply focused on material gains eg the most money, and the best reputation. This emphasises the disregard they had for the idea of collective responsibility in society and how they truly believed that by adhering to socialist beliefs they would lose their wealth and popularity.
Finally, towards the end of the play, Eric also changes his attitude towards the lower class when he shouts “And I say this girl is dead and we all helped to kill her - and that's what matters.” Eric uses the collective pronoun “we” to show how he is starting to take on the concept of collective responsibility as the Inspector said. The sentence is disjointed with hyphens perhaps emphasising the level of guilt he feels for his terrible actions. The hyphen created a pause perhaps as he is contemplating how to articulate his next sentence so it impacts his parents and teaches them to change their ways. The hyphen could also represent Eric's chocking anger towards his parents for not adhering to the concept of collective responsibility and only focusing on their materialistic wealth. Eric’s change is evident as he shouts and talks back to his parents which directly contrasts his timid nature at the start of the play. His use of the phrase “and that is what matters” juxtaposes Mr Birling’s worry about his “honour”. This could be done by Priestley to try and show the real issue at hand.
In conclusion, Priestley clearly explores the theme of collective responsibility throughout his play to try and change the views of the upper class by showing them the detrimental effects of their actions that they probably wouldn't think twice about as they view themselves as above the rest of society.