How Is Mr Birling Presented In An Inspector Calls

J.B Pristley wrote the play ‘An Inspector Calls’ for a specific purpose; to highlight the injustices of society in 1912. The original audience understood the context of the play and endured two world wars. Pristley presents a socialist point of view, using his characters to convey his ideals. Priestly’s overriding message in the play is that ‘We are members of one body. We are responsible for each other.’ The characters symbolize how society should be. Mr. Birling is the opposite of Pristley's view: a capitalist, unsympathetic and a fool. He is presented with the problem. At the opening of the play, Mr. Birling is presented as superior and selfish. In the stage directions he is described as a ‘heavy-looking, rather portentous man in his middle fifties.’ This
Birling decides that rather than feeling sorry for the girl, the more important issue for him is to cover up what's happened in case it affects the possibility of him getting his knighthood in a couple of weeks. Show in the quote ‘I've got to cover this up as soon as I can.’ He thinks that her death will affect how society will view him if the news gets out that he has had a part in her death. Throughout the drama, Mr. Birling is portrayed as selfish and thinking solely of his own reputation. When it is discovered at the end of the play that the inspector might not be real, and that Eva might not have died, Mr. Birling’s immediate reaction is to exclaim ’But I care. I was almost certain for a knighthood.’ He only cares about him and his social status, but the audience will be more concerned with the wellbeing of Eva and will be unsympathetic towards him. Mr. Birling even goes as far as saying ‘There’s no excuse for what both your mother and I did.’ This suggests that he still hasn’t learned anything from the inspector and is actually trying to defend himself. Mr. Birling is presented as an unsympathetic character not only because he is self-centered and selfish, but because he has been an absent father