An Inspector Calls

An Inspector Calls

An Inspector Calls is set in 1912, during the Edwardian Era. It tells the story of a family’s journey from ignorance to enlightenment by using both the plight of an unseen working class girl, and the exploration and questions of an (apparently) conscientious police Inspector in an attempt to change the attitudes of the middle class characters created for this play. This drama brings to light the important issue of how the working class is treated by their so-called ‘superiors’, but it could be argued that the playwright also has the intention of making what would have been (at the time of its first performances) theatre audiences made up largely of the middle class walk away from the play at its conclusion, reviewing their lives. Its success over the years is due, I believe, to its mixture of entertainment and desire to edify the audiences, and this makes it enthralling to watch; but what does J. B. Priestley’s use of setting contribute to An Inspector Calls, and how successful is he through his use of this device?

An Inspector Calls has one setting throughout: the dining room. This has become, over time, an archetypal symbol of middle class England and, by using this, Priestley suggests to what would have originally been a mainly middle class audience that the events of the play are meant to be a reflection of their own lives. By its conclusion, Priestley suggests to the audience that he intended the moral message of the play to be universal and not just contained within the content of the play. This message is also reinforced at the end when its conclusion is left open, which leaves the audience to reflect on their own lives and behaviour. Because the dining room is so closely associated with middle class England, it is also used by Priestley, I believe, as a representation of so-called ‘polite’ society. At the beginning of the play, the dining room protects the family against the outside world: the Birlings and Gerald Croft are in the dining room, celebrating the engagement of Sheila to Gerald. Though it is meant to be a cheerful, happy, romantic time, the conversation is stilted and forced: Mr Birling, for example, talks about business, economics and the welfare of the country and the country, believing that Great Britain is in ‘for a period of steadily increasing prosperity’. There is very little mention of any kind of love or emotion between Sheila and Gerald. This suggests to the audience that the marriage is more about class and power, and less about romance and love. As a contrast to the sense of an arranged relationship between Gerald and Sheila, the Inspector encourages Gerald to reveal details of the time he and Eva (or Daisy) shared. The relationship obviously upsets Shelia; there are hints, however, that Gerald had genuine feelings for Daisy, conceivably that he was even in love with her. He treated her well while she was with him and the Inspector says that ‘he (Gerald) at least had some affection for her and made her happy for a time’. Nevertheless, their relationship did have to finish because of their positions in society. At that time, to marry a working class girl would have brought shame upon the family name. By bringing this situation into the play, Priestley is not so much blaming