Summary Of The Play 'An Inspector Calls'

An Inspector Calls:
Revision notes
These notes are to help kick-start your revision of the play for the GCSE exam.

Good Luck!

Miss Stonehouse

Introduction
There are a number of references to external events within the play and these could provide the areas which could be developed further. Among these are: 
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The Titanic
The emergence of Russia as a world power
The outbreak of World War One
The importance of the Women’s Rights movement
The rise of Socialism
The writings of H G Wells

Key Notes:
 very compact structure to the play, nothing is allowed to distract the audience from the central theme. There is no sub-plot.

 the play takes place in just one location, the action is continuous
 Act
When he learns of all this he exclaims 'You damned fool - why didn't you come to me when you found yourself in this mess?'

 Eric's reply indicates that Mr Birling was never close to his son 'Because you're not the kind of chap a man could turn to when he's in trouble'. Such a response indicates that things aren't going to improve much after the play ends
 he represents a very unattractive sort of person. At the end of the play he grudgingly wishes things were better but even here he still thinks in terms of money
'Look, Inspector - I'd give thousands'
 he continues to ignore the shameful things that his family has done. When it appears that the Inspector might be a hoaxer he is happy to believe that everything is as it was a few hours ago. He copies the Inspector and laughs when he remembers the faces of Eric and Sheila and accuses them of being 'the famous younger generation who know it all'. This is an example of pride coming before a fall, a moment later of course he is panicking as the phone rings again
 Mr Birling represents Priestley's hatred of businessmen who are only interested in making money. He will never alter his ways and it is left to the younger generation to learn from their
The attention surrounding her important engagement gives her great pleasure, showing her to be somewhat self-centred. She thus starts the play as someone whom the audience would regard as superficial however, this changes once she hears of the girl’s death and her potential part in it and becomes more caring and sensitive. She shows genuine remorse about the fact that it was her who caused the girl to lose her job at the shop.
 at the start of the play she is 'very pleased with life'. She is young, attractive and has just become engaged
 her happiness is soon to be destroyed as is her faith in her family
 her response to the tragedy is one of the few encouraging things to come out of the play. She is genuinely upset when she hears of Eva's death and learns from her own behaviour  she is very distressed by the girl's suicide and thinks that her father's behaviour was unacceptable. She readily agrees that she behaved very badly and insists that she never meant the girl any harm.
 the Inspector says that she is only partly responsible and later on, when he is about to question Gerald, he encourages her to stay and listen to what he has to say so that she doesn't feel entirely