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Analysis of Key Quotations in 'The Inspector'

Apr 21, 2025

Key Quotations and Analysis for 'The Inspector'

Overview

  • Focus on 10 critical quotations to achieve a Grade 9.
  • Most important quotation: Inspector's final speech.

Political and Social Messages

  • Quotation: "millions of John Smiths and Eva Smiths."

    • Eva represents exploited working classes.
    • Political message against upper/business classes like the Birlings and Croft.
  • Christian Imagery: "we are all of one body."

    • References to Jesus and The Last Supper.
    • Links Christianity with socialism.
    • Appeals to the largely Christian audience of the time.

Anti-War Message

  • Context: Play published in 1945 post-WWII.
  • Links capitalism to war.
  • Quotation: "Fire and Blood and Anguish."
    • Direct reference to wartime suffering.
    • Suggests socialism as a deterrent to war.

Violence and Brutality

  • Violence of Eva's Death:
    • Quotation: "burnt her insides out, of course, she was in great Agony."
    • Designed to shock Sheila and the audience.
    • Reflects on the cruelty of the Birlings and Gerald.

Capitalism vs. Moral Responsibility

  • Quotation: "better to ask for the Earth than to take it."
    • Critique of rapacious capitalist society.
    • Highlighted through Gerald's defense: "we are responsible citizens and not criminals."
    • Shows ruling classes' moral and literal corruption.

Feminist Context and Women’s Role

  • Representation of Women: Eva & Sheila
    • Quotation: "put ourselves in the place of these young women."
    • Emphasizes pre-1912 women's lack of power.
    • 1945 audience urged to use their power (voting rights achieved).

Supernatural Elements

  • Inspector as a Supernatural Presence:
    • Quotation from Sheila: "when the inspector came in just after father said that."
    • Mirrored in Dickens’ 'A Christmas Carol.'
    • Inspector summoned to correct selfish viewpoints.

Responsibility and Blame

  • Inspector's Departure:
    • Challenges characters to accept blame.
    • Christian parallel: choice between good and evil.

Warnings and Consequences

  • Repeated Warning: "each of you helped to kill her, remember, remember, remember."
    • Suggests they won't learn the lesson, leading to future wars.
    • Eric and Sheila's potential to change is symbolically limited.

Feminist Power and Change

  • Eva's Posthumous Influence:
    • Parallels with suffragette movement.
    • Urging women in the 1945 audience to maintain their wartime roles and push for equality.

Conclusion

  • The play is a call to action against capitalism, war, and for social equality.
  • Encourages the audience to remember the inspector's lessons and act upon them.
  • Suggestion to make notes and apply them to essays for better retention and top grades.