An Inspector Calls Flashcards
“If you don’t…”
“come down sharply on these people, they’ll be asking for the earth.”
“Girls…”
“…of that class”
“Well, Eva…”
“…Smith’s gone… you can’t even say ‘I’m sorry Eva Smith’”
“Just used her…”
“…as if she was an animal, a thing, not a person…”
“(unhappily) Look…”
“Inspector, I’d pay thousands - thousands…”
“But these girls…”
“aren’t cheap labour - they’re people.”
“I can’t accept…”
“…responsibility. If we were all responsible for everything that happened to everybody we’d had anything to do with, it would be very awkward wouldn’t it?”
“Birling: They could…”
“…go and work somewhere else. It’s a free country…
Eric: It isn’t if you can’t go work somewhere else.”
“Why shouldn’t they…”
“ask for higher wages…you said yourself she was a good worker”
“I don’t give a damn
whether I stay here anymore”
“It frightens me
the way you talk”
“If she’d had been some
plain little creature, I don’t suppose I’d have done it. But she was very pretty and looked as if she could take care of herself”
“The girl’s still dead
isn’t she? No one’s brought her back to life, have they?”
Inspector: “And was it the girl’s
fault?”
Sheila: “No, not really. It was my own fault.”
“Now, Sheila, I’m not defending
him. But you must understand that a lot of young men…”
“I think she had only herself to blame
… I did my duty… I’ve done nothing wrong… I was justified.”
“Yes, and you killed her - and the child
she’d have had too - my child - your own grandchild - you killed them both - damn you damn you…”
“There’s every excuse
for what your mother and I did.”
“…But now you’re beginning
all over again to pretend nothing much has happened…”
“there’ll be a public scandal… who
here will suffer from that more than I will?”
“…the fact remains that I did what
I did. And mother did what she did. And the rest of you did what you did…”
