Hello everybody, welcome to this new video on An Inspector Calls where I'm going to look at some of the more complex and sophisticated points of analysis to do with the play. Spoiler alert, you need to either know the entire play or be happy to learn plot details you didn't know about before you watch this video. So the first thing I want to talk about is the genre of the play and you can look at this in two different ways. You can see it as a morality play or a work of detective fiction.
I'm going to look briefly at both. What is a morality play? Well, Encyclopædia Britannica tells us it is an allegorical drama popular in Europe during the 15th and 16th centuries in which the characters personify moral qualities such as charity or vice or abstractions as death or youth in which moral lessons are taught.
So it's a very old form of theatre which essentially instructs audiences about good and evil. One of the things I like about the morality play is that you would have to be a good writer. different characters who would really typify certain character traits. And we do see that in an inspector call. So you might, for example, look at the seven deadly sins of pride, envy, gluttony, lust, anger, greed, sloth, and see which characters link up to these.
And I'm not going to go into that in great detail. You can look at that perhaps for homework or in class. But, you know, you could say, OK, well, let's have a look at some of the characters.
Mr. Burling is greedy because he wants more money. Sheila is. guilty of envy when she complains about Eva and so on and so forth. So we can certainly see an Inspector Calls as a morality play where we learn a valuable lesson. And of course, I think that's one of the things that makes it seem so simple.
The overarching, never-ending message is that we should not be just thinking of ourselves, but we should look after one another. So it works as a morality play. But a little bit more interesting than that is, I think, the way it works as...
detective thriller, a work of detective fiction. Now if you're studying something like The Sign of Four as your 19th century text or even if you just know a little bit about detective fiction in books or films you'll know that what normally happens is we have a detective, an intelligent detective, who solves a crime, a serious crime, for example a murder or in Inspector Gall's case a suicide and we do have that in this play don't we? We have Inspector Gall investigating the crime of what led to the suicide of Eva Smith.
So Priestley's play revolves around the death of a young woman, but here's where it gets very clever. Whereas most traditional detective stories involve the narrowing down of suspects from several to one, and Inspector Calls inverts that. It turns it on its head, as one by one, nearly all of the characters in the play are found to be guilty. Now why does Priestley do this?
Why is he inverting, turning upside down the generic convention of a detective thriller. It's because he wants to make this overarching point that society as a whole is guilty of neglecting and abusing its most vulnerable members. A just society, we learn through Inspector Ghoul, is one that demonstrates social responsibility.
So it's quite interesting because the inversion of the detective thriller is a very clever and often overlooked device used by Priestley. but also other devices back this up as well. I want to have a look at how sentence structure gets the message across that everyone is jointly responsible for the death of Eva.
So the next slide is used with permission from a wonderful friend and teacher, Mr. Bryers. You can follow him on Twitter, Tom underscore Bryers, a really great teacher who provides some fantastic resources. And I've asked him for permission to use a couple of his ideas and slides in this presentation. And. and he was very gracious in allowing me to do so.
Do check him out on Twitter. He's got some great resources on Macbeth and Inspector Calls and other texts as well. So something from Mr. Breyers is this idea.
Now every time I use a slide which is from Mr. Breyers, Mr. Breyers Delve, I'm putting up the little picture here in the top corner so you know where it's come from, his resources. But this is something really clever. When Inspector Call says this. Because what happened to her then may have determined what happened to her afterwards. And what happened to her afterwards may have driven her to suicide, a chain of events.
What we've got here is the structural device of anodyplosis, which is beginning a sentence or clause by repeating the last word or words of the previous sentence or clause. So we see an example from Yoda. Fear leads to anger.
Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering. The last word is also then the first word of the next sentence. So what we see in the speech here from Inspector Gould is an example of anadiplosis, what happened to her afterwards, ending one clause and starting the next clause.
And this is very interesting because what's happening here is this structural device, this use of sentence structure. is essentially linking everybody together and making it clear that everybody is jointly responsible so just as the inversion of the expectations of the detective fiction genre by having everybody be culpable for the the death of Eva Smith that shows this sort of joint responsibility so does the anodyplosis and how would you put that into a paragraph because many of you have sent me Questions on Twitter, at MrBroughEnglish, if you want to tweet or follow me on Twitter, saying, OK, great idea, how do we put it all into a paragraph? Well, again, from MrBrysdale, here's a great example.
Soon after his entrance, the audience starts to realise that the inspector's investigation focuses on the surprising links between different events and people. The inspector initiates this idea of connections through anodyplosis by repeating what happened to her afterwards at the end of one clause and the beginning of the next. The sentence structure itself cleverly emphasises how the content of these statements is inextricably connected and leads on from one another.
Next, he memorably summarises this concept with the metaphorical image of a chain of events, the concrete noun chain, referring to an object that embodies physical linking, and even more so than that, however, it connotes heaviness and imprisonment, perhaps inferring that the links between various events involving the Burlings and Eva Smith could be what weighs down the entire family. That's an example of that high level analysis, taking the key image of chain, taking the sentence structure of anodyplosis, and then explaining how all of those things make the same point as the inversion of the detected fiction genre expectations by saying, look, everybody is responsible. This isn't something that just one person has made happen, but everybody is responsible. So I think that's a really good point to bring into your general analysis. And I think this quotation is one that's definitely worth memorising.
I do have the An Inspector Calls Revision Quotations song, which you can see in the revision songs playlist. But I think this is one that is worth memorising where those of you who want to learn more quotations and perhaps the longer quotations, this is a good one to memorise because it hammers home the point that everyone's actions are interconnected. and all are responsible for the death of Eva. Very clever.
So the next thing I want to talk to you about is the setting. And I think one of the things that's really struck me recently when preparing for this video is that there are lots of things that happen in the play that we can analyse, but I also think we can analyse what doesn't happen in the play, what isn't there in the play. And one of those things is linked to setting. So this is the first page of the play, this huge stage direction, and we can... analyse that.
We've already analysed that, haven't we? The pink and intimate lighting suggesting that it's a symbol of the way that the Burlings view things through, rose-tinted glasses. And then when the inspector comes, the lighting changes to brighter and harder, a spotlight, an interrogation, a revelation of the truth of what is actually happening in this family.
And that, again, is something we've analysed before. We can analyse lots of the stage directions. But what I want to think about today is what isn't there, such as scene changes of location. Because as we see, all three acts, which are continuous, take place in the dining room of the Burlings'house.
Now I don't know if you've ever gone to the theatre, but the kind of changes of scenery between scenes, between acts, are a big part of theatre normally. So why is it that the play takes place all in one single setting of... the dining room of the Burlings house.
Well there's a number of points of analysis we can bring from this. Of course it suggests their self-absorption, the way they literally think of nothing outside of their own lives because we are not given a glimpse of anything outside of this one room in this one house. It suggests their disconnectedness from the wider world.
Again, there is no sense that there is any life outside of this world for them. It helps to create a claustrophobic mood. And of course when the inspector arrives and the lighting changes to brighter and harder, it sort of mirrors that idea of an interrogation room, like a police holding cell-like atmosphere.
But also by never changing the setting, Priestly allows us to focus on the main point of the play, the moral lesson. It's a very no-frills play, there's no kind of great scenery or stage props or anything like that because the moral lesson, coming back to the idea of it being a morality play, is what we're supposed to learn from this play. And I think one of the points of higher level analysis, those of you looking for the top marks, is to think, okay, in some ways an Inspector Calls is very simplistic. The dramatic irony is so over the top.
The moral lesson is so obvious. It's so overt when Inspector Calls says, we are members of one body, we are responsible for each other. It's so obviously those are the words of J.B. Priestley. And I think sometimes that feels a little bit kind of over the top and a bit pantomime-like, you know, this is just too in your face and kind of, you know, there's no subtlety to it at all.
But of course, part of that is the lack of subtlety as a result of the lack of other things happening. So the fact that the whole thing takes place in one room, that adds to the lack of subtlety. There are other things going on that I want to talk about as well that add to this very precise focus on the moral message of the play. That's all we're supposed to get from this play.
And another thing that points to that is the vagueness of Inspector Ghoul. So if you think about this being the first page of the play, look at the detail of the stage directions. And yet when we get to Inspector Ghoul, the details about him as a character are limited.
So for a playwright who goes into great detail in some of his stage directions, very little is told to us about Gaul. Even his dialogue reveals what he is not rather than what he is. So let me just make this point again. When he says, I don't play golf, he's revealing something to us that he doesn't do rather than something that he does do. So the description is very sparse.
What we actually learn about Inspector Gaul is very little. And the things we learn about him are things like this, things he doesn't do. do. So why is this?
Well because of this lack of biographical detail the inspector seems less like a person and a character that we might get sort of drawn into and like or dislike and more like a moral force. One which mercilessly pursues the wrongs committed by the Burlings and Gerald demanding they face up to the consequences of their actions. There is no kind of what do we think of this character it's the message he brings and again that message being We are members of one body, we are responsible for each other. That attack on capitalist values is the one overarching message that J.B.
Priestley wants us to take from this play. If you don't know about that, check out Mr. Brough's Guide to an Inspector Calls, available in paperback on Amazon. So, yeah, when he gives his speech, we don't live alone, we're members of one body, we're responsible for each other, and I tell you that the time will soon come when, if men will not learn that lesson, then they'll be taught it in fire and blood and anguish.
We don't live alone, good night. We see that this character in Spectre Gaul is less an idea from, this message, sorry, is less an idea from a character within the play and more as the moral lesson we're supposed to take away from this, let's remember, example of a morality play. And of course this message is the exact opposite.
to that of Mr. Burling, whose capitalist values are clear for all to see. Something else that I want to look at then, Priestley's use of structure, which suggests the clash between the values of Mr. Burling and the values of Inspector Gould. So let's have a look.
This is the part in the play when Burling is giving this long speech, and then look at the stage direction. We hear the sharp ring of a doorbell. Birling stops to listen.
Now look what Birling was saying. He was saying here and so he was about to continue his sentence, his idea of all of his sort of capitalist values and then he's interrupted by the doorbell and I think this is such an interesting use of structure within the play because it is the difference I guess between Birling and Inspector Gould that is shown to us through the fact that the inspector's arrival cuts Birling off mid-sentence and that kind of enacts in miniature the clash between the two not just the two characters because remember Priestley isn't you know so interested in characters but the ideological positions that they hold this idea of capitalism this idea of socialism the clash between the two is in many ways symbolized through the structure of the text through Birling's words being cut and interrupted by the doorbell which of course signals the introduction of Inspector Gaw. Something else I want to talk about is the dramatic irony being so blunt and so over the top in this play. One of the things that I as a teacher find a bit over the top and a bit kind of pantomime-ish is the use of dramatic irony. Now dramatic irony of course if you don't know is where the audience knows something that characters on stage do not know and dramatic irony is used in lots of plays if you're studying Macbeth as many of you are you know there's one example in Act 1 Scene 3 where the witches call Macbeth Thane of Cawdor and Macbeth is baffled he's saying the Thane of Cawdor lives, but as an audience we've already seen Duncan condemn him to death and bestow the title on Macbeth.
That is an example of dramatic irony where, you know, Macbeth doesn't realise something that we know. But, and this I think is the really important thing, dramatic irony can be fairly subtle and can be fairly kind of, you know, clever in that we as an audience have to work out the... significance of what's taking place.
The dramatic irony, particularly with Mr Birling in An Inspector Calls, is the complete opposite. It is clumsy, it is over-the-top, and a great example of that, again this is a slide from Mr Briarsdell, is this quotation where he says that the Titanic is unsinkable, absolutely unsinkable. Now this is of course something that we know as an audience audience that Mr. Berlin was wrong and the audience watching the play knew that it was wrong as well. So there's a kind of obvious mistake being made here, but a very over-the-top example of dramatic irony.
And it does seem a bit clumsy. But the key thing is that it underlines the fact that an inspector calls this a play with a point to make and a character whose sole job is to make it. Okay, so the morality play, if we're going to learn a lesson from this play, it needs to be very, very obvious. What I love about this quotation, and again, this might be another one worth memorizing, is not just does it say the Titanic is unsinkable, but we've got repetition of the word unsinkable. Okay, so that exaggerates the error that he makes because he sort of says the wrong thing twice.
And the intensifier, the word absolutely, which again... exaggerates his certainty. So I just think the words unsinkable, absolutely unsinkable are very clever to analyse because the repetition of the word unsinkable, along with this intensifier of absolutely, deepens the excruciating dramatic irony as we realise not only is he wrong, but he is so wrong. And as a result of that, everything that he stands for is so wrong.
That's the thing with Mr. Burling. J.B. Priestley wants to present a man who has these capitalist values and then to completely show him to be, in many ways, an idiot. To suggest that not just is he wrong about the Titanic and some other things he predicts, but actually, like the Germans don't want war, he says, and of course the audience know that he was wrong there.
But actually, if he's wrong about those things, he's wrong about the other things. And the values he stands for is wrong as well. And that's the whole idea of the dramatic irony.
So my initial reaction was the dramatic irony was a bit over the top and clumsy. But of course, it's underlying in the fact that an inspector cause is a play with a point to make, the morality play, and that message has to be hammered home very clearly. How do we put that all into a paragraph? Again, from Mr. Breisdell, the first act introduces Arthur Birling as a character who is ignorant, or at least on the wrong side of history, with regards to many topical issues. For instance.
He memorably states that the Titanic is unsinkable, absolutely unsinkable. Though this was commonly believed in 1912 before the ship set sail, any audience from 1945 onwards would have been astounded by how incorrect Berlin is here. The Titanic sank in April 1912, having collided with an iceberg, approximately 1,500 passengers drowned. Quite the opposite of unsinkable.
Priestley's wording also heightens the dramatic irony. Now this is the really clever idea because... Everybody gets that this is dramatic irony, and I think I would say out of 100 people writing about Mr. Birling, 90 of them are likely to write about the dramatic irony of the things he gets wrong.
But this close word analysis is where it gets much more sophisticated, and this is the sort of thing I'd encourage you to look to do. Priestley's wording also heightens the dramatic irony. Not only does Birling utter the false adjective unsinkable, he confidently repeats it and exaggerates it. certainty with the intensifier absolutely.
The audience are left wondering if Böhrling is so wrong about the Titanic and World War I, like the Germans don't want war, are his capitalist political views equally misguided? So really nice example from Mr Breyersdell there of how you might put all of that into a paragraph. Okay, so I want to have a look at one or two other things to finish off this video.
And one is to do with Edna. Now, every year people say to me online, I hope it's not Edna. I hope the question is not about Edna. Because of course Edna is such a minor character.
But I want to encourage you with how we can analyse characters, okay? And this is something that I think is useful for all literature study. We don't just analyse what a character says and... does we analyze how others speak about a character and how others act towards a character as well that's so important when you analyze a character it's not just what they say or do but how others speak about them how would they speak to them and you know that is something that helps us with our understanding of a character and again we can look at then from mr. Brysdale the way that Edna is spoken to by Mr. Birling. It's so significant.
This is the way Birling speaks to Edna, which highlights so many key points, even though Edna herself doesn't say anything in response. Although Edna says little herself, or says little, I should say, the harshness with which Mr. Birling communicates towards her contributes to the play's exploration of class dynamics. When the inspector arrives, Burling demands, Show him in here, give us some more light. These two simple sentences are bluntly short and monosyllabic, suggesting no attempt at politeness.
Now let's just pause there. Really clever point. The monosyllabic, almost primitive, caveman-like communication of show him in here, give us some more light, all of these words having one syllable, shows that there is no attempt to speak... politely or eloquently or to have any attempt to impress Edna, she is spoken to in this primitive, condescending manner, because that's how Birling and the others feel about her. Both also start with clear imperatives, show and give, as if Birling expects his orders to be followed instantaneously.
So there again is some analysis of the kind of words that essentially are ordering her around. and that those are the first words. So again, this is structure analysis, high-level sentence structure analysis. It's not that he's telling her what to do, it's that the first word in each sentence is that imperative bossy word that is suggesting that he has no attempt to sweeten her up or be polite, it's just, you do this for me.
In the third act, the bell rings again and Burling treats her with a similar attitude. Edna will go, I asked her to wait up. By this point, it must be very late in the evening, but the phrase wait up implies she has been made to extend her typical working hours, presumably with no choice or recompense.
Such offhand comments may appear insignificant, but they subtly add to the dramatic force of Eva's narrative, together showing the pressure for working class women to unhesitantly obey their middle class employer, even if working conditions are unfair. What an amazing analysis. So this is the end of the video, guys. Let me just encourage you to subscribe to the channel if you haven't done so already. Go and check out Mr. Brysdale on Twitter, his resources, look through his tweets.
And I encourage you to do that as a student as well, as a teacher, because they will really help you. And thank you for watching.