Plot and Character development Flashcards
Act 1 - Opening stage directions
AIC was written in 1945, but set in
1912. The play opens in the Birling family’s dining room. They are clearly a wealthy family, but there are hints that not everything is as it seems. The setting is rather oppressive, and gives the impression of entrapment within an upper-class milieu. Priestley also introduces the characters.
Act 1 - Celebrating the engagement
The family celebrate Sheila and Gerald’s engagement, but Eric’s tipsiness and Sheila’s questioning of Gerald hint at cracks in the family’s façade. Gerald’s parents
are absent, suggesting they disagree with his engagement. Mr B. makes several speeches articulating his capitalist viewpoint.
Eric tries to question this, but is silenced by his father. The servant - Edna - circulates throughout as a
visual reminder that the upper-classes ignore the working-classes. Then the ladies leave the room.
Act 1 - Goole questions Mr Birling
Inspector Goole rings the doorbell, interrupting Mr Birling’s capitalist speech and therefore showing how socialism can replace capitalism. The Inspector tells Mr Birling, Gerald and Eric that there has been a suicide: a young woman (Eva Smith) has died. The audience discover that Eva used to work for Mr Birling, but was fired when she was part of a group asking for higher pay.
Act 1 - Goole questions Sheila
Sheila enters and is shocked to hear about the suicide. We learn that when Eva left the factory, she gained employment in a clothes shop called Millwards. Sheila was shopping there one day, and became angry at Eva; she insisted that Eva were fired. Unlike her father, Sheila shows remorse for what she has done.
Act 2 - Goole questions Gerald
Start of Act 2.
Inspector Goole turns his attention to Gerald, who reveals that he met Eva at the Palace Bar the previous summer. Eva was homeless and penniless, so Gerald gave her a place to live. The had an affair. In the autumn, Gerald ended the relationship anc gave Eva some money. She went to stay at the seaside. Sheila returns the engagement ring to him.
Act 2 - Goole questions
Both Gerald and Eric have left the room. Mrs Birling asks to see the photograph of Eva, and Inspector Goole questions her.
Reluctantly and haughtily, Mrs Birling admits that she met Eva at her charity (the Brumley Women’s Organisation). Eva came to the charity asking for help because she was pregnant; Mrs Birling refused to help on the basis that Eva was unmarried.
Sheila becomes increasingly angry with her parents. It soon becomes clear that it the father of Eva’s child was Eric.
Act 3 - Goole questions
Eric returns at the start of Act 3. He reveals that he met Eva at the Palace Bar after her relationship with Gerald had ended.
Eric returned to Eva’s flat, and may have pressured her into having sex. Their affair continued, and Eva became pregnant.
Eric tried to support her financially, but when Eva found out that he had stolen the money from his father’s business, she refused this help.
Act 3 - The denouement
Now that the truth has been revealed, Inspector Goole takes centre stage and explains what we have learnt: that we are all part of one community and should take responsibility for other people. He leaves abruptly. Gerald returns, and suggests that the Inspector was a fraud. After some investigation, it turns ou that there was no Inspector Goole on the Brumley police force.
Most of the family are relieved, but Eric and Sheila think that this revelation changes nothing.
The phone rings. Birling answers and hears that a policeman is on his way; a girl has committed suicide. The play ends, but there is a sense that the Birling family will be doomed to repeat the evening’s events until they are able to learn their lesson.
