Inspector Calls Essay Ideology

688 Words3 Pages
Explore how Birling and the Inspector represent “opposite ideological points of view”? Priestley uses his characters and opposite ideological points of view throughout the play to convey to the audience how people’s political and social views differed through society. A major theme is responsibility; Priestley is interested in our personal responsibility for our own actions and our collective responsibility to society. The play explores the effect of class, age and sex on people's attitudes to responsibility, and shows how prejudice can prevent people from acting responsibly. Mr. Birling is a microcosm of higher class business men in the period the play was set. He also portrays the naive attitudes of the elderly. From the start Mr. Birling is suggested as a bombastic and dogmatic character. His view about war- “Germans don’t want war. Nobody wants war” makes the audience doubt his judgement as they know there will be a war, showing irony. I think Priestley used Mr. Birling’s behaviour to show the theme of capitalism and how it affected people’s thoughts and attitudes towards everyday life. This suggests to the audience that the higher class were not nice people and were just out for the money. He seems very selfish; he wants to protect himself and his family. He believes that socialist ideas that stress the importance of the community is "nonsense" and that "a man has to make his own way." Even though Mr. Birling is of a high class, he is aware of people who are his social superiors, which is why he shows off about the port to Gerald, "it's exactly the same port your father gets." He is proud that he is likely to be knighted, as that would move him even higher in social circles. I believe the Priestley’s purpose was to show that the higher class were never satisfied with what they had and were always looking out for bigger and better things that they could
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