“Public men, Mr Birling, have respects as well as privileges” What do you learn about social responsibility in the play ‘An Inspector calls’? The play ‘An Inspector Calls’ was written by JB Priestly in 1946 but set in 1912. The play highlights the values held in society by different groups of people. The Birling family are middle class people and believe they are so thrilled about Gerald and Sheila’s engagement. They all also believe they cannot be blamed for the death of Eva Smith and try to deny any contact with her.
You haven’t met that room full of God-freaks. (72) Anything that has to do with Danny, she hides from. For example, when she invites Jason over, every time he brings the topic about the accident, she would bring something else and change the subject. Because Becca deals with Danny’s death separately from Howie, it is difficult for the two to be there for each other, which causes their relationship to grown distant. Despite the growing separation, Howie tries his best to comfort Becca.
Priestly presents Mr Birling and the Inspector in two different lights. Mr Birling right from the very start showed no empathy towards Eva smith and doesn't start to either throughout the play. He is more interested in his knighthood and doesn't want to admit he has done wrong. “I can’t accept any responsibility. If we were all responsible for everything that happened to everybody we’d had anything to do with, it would be very awkward” this further emphasises Birlings ignorance and cowardice attitude towards responsibility within society.
Mr Birling is a married man who is very important and confident who likes to lecture his children. Mr Birling is the owner of a successful factory. He realises that when his daughter gets married to Gerald it is going to do a lot of good to his business. He does not pay his employees very much and will refuse to pay them anymore. Mr Birling is a very selfish man who ‘has to make his way’ and doesn’t think of anyone but himself and his family; he thinks the community is stupid.
Paragraphs on contrasting Arthur Birling and Sheila Birling Arthur Throughout the whole of the play we are able to see that Arthur Birling does not care about the death of Eva Smith. This links in to the fact that is shows he is not taking responsibility for the suicide. Birling states, “Well, don’t tell me that’s because I discharged her from my employment nearly two years ago.” From this short statement we are able to deduce that Birling is always very dismissive of the idea that he had anything to do with the death of Eva Smith. This statement also shows that in a way Birling is worried in case the Inspector finds another alternative meaning. To continue, it could also be said that Arthur Birling is in a way a coward as he not willing to take responsibility for his part in the suicide.
We could also infer from this that Lord Illingworth is trying to shape or teach his son to become a version of himself, he behaves very vicariously. Throughout the play Wilde uses Lord Illingworth as a tool to provoke carious reactions from the audience. The first of these can be said to be admiration of his unsurpassable wit and popularity. However these tones of appreciation soon begin to sour and turn to notions of repulse. I feel Wilde did this to express how easily people can lose their highly regarded reputation; this is the social message throughout the play as Lord Illingworth becomes ‘a man of no importance’.
The King tried to force men to give up their rights to make laws. The King also called men together to make laws in the most inconvenient times and places, so they won't be able to go discuss the new laws. He made them pay all kinds of taxes without asking them about it. The declaration was the way colonist expressed that they wanted to be free from the King and of England. Some of the laws the king made were unfair and unconventional.
There was simply no record of Emily paying her taxes. Emily said that she doesn't have any taxes in Jefferson and continuously repeated that, and wouldn't let the man explain to her what was going on. She got frustrated and eventually asked Tobe to escort them out. The sheriff does not know how to handle a mind like Emily's. The sheriff does not know how to speak to Emily obviously in a sense where she would understand, if that is even possible.
In the story “A Good Man is Hard to Find”, the grandmother is a manipulative person. She influence or attempted to influence the behavior or emotions of other people. The grandmother tries to be a person that she is not. Do not try to be someone you are not. Only when the grandmother was facing death, she understood where she had gone wrong in her life.
Some would think that they will miss their families and relationships and most of all, love. But the people in Utopia have never experienced any of these. They were brought up in conditioning centers and feel that parents and family are primitive. The mere sound of the word annoys them. Monogamy is discouraged by the utopian society and considered improper “Four months of Henry Foster, without having another man…why, he’d be furious if he knew…” This restrains people from getting too emotionally involved and putting their loved one’s needs before the society’s needs.