Short plot summary:
The play deals with an inspector, named Goole, who arrives by the Birling family, who is celebrating Sheila's engagement to Gerald Croft. He tells about Eva Smith's suicide. After lots of questions it turns out that they are all more or less responsible for this tragically death and after the inspector left they find out that he wasn't a real inspector and that no girl died.
The play opens with the engagement celebration Sheila Birling and Gerald Croft. It all takes place in the dining room of the Birlings, near Brumley. The family is very happy of this marriage because it is an ideal financial connection to the business rival Croft. The celebration is interrupted by the appearance of inspector Goole, who enters and tells them of the unpleasant suicide of a young woman named Eva Smith. He continues that Eva Smith drank …show more content…
Eva worked in the Birling factory two years ago. She was the leader of the workers, who demanded more money. The conversation indicates that every person in this house, except Goole had some influence on Eva Smith's way of death: Mr. Birling fired Eva Smith, Sheila complained about her to her new employer, a cloth shop for rich people and so Eva was dismissed and again without any work. Gerald Croft kept her as his girlfriend and when she wanted to get help from a charity committee, Mrs. Birling refused help. At last the Birling's son Eric got Eva pregnant and was not able to persuade her to marry him. After the inspector left the house, the Birlings turned to the question whether the inspector was a real police officer or not. They phoned the hospital, where Eva Smith should have been and also to the local police station to get some more information about the suicide of Eva Smith or about the police officer, who appeared by the Birling's house. But they experienced that nobody knows neither Eva Smith nor