Character analysis Essay

Priestley describes him in the opening stage directions as a rather portentous man, full of his possess self-importance. In the play, he is certainly very concerned with his social position he twice mentions that he was Lord Mayor as a management of impressing Gerald (pp.8, 11), and mentions the knighthood to him, even though it is far from definite. He is solely worried ab go forth how his familys reputation will suffer at the inquest when he hears of Mrs Birlings part in the filles death (p.45), and he is more concerned about how to coverup Erics thefts (p.54) than about how to put them obligation. He tries to use first Geralds family name (p.13) and then his friendship with the Chief Constable (p.16) as ways of bullying the Inspector he obviously believes that others argon as easily impressed by social connections as he is. (We know he is easily impressed because of his evident pride at Geralds family background he obviously believes he has made a good match for Sheila.)His k ey characteristic is his complacency. He is well-off (as the opening stage directions suggest), and he believes he always will be that were in for a time of steadily increasing prosperity (p.6). This success, however, has been at the expense of others he threw the girl out of her job for asking for a modest rise, and intends in the future to work with Crofts Limited for lower costs and higher prices (p.4), exploiting his power as a capitalist to profit at the expense of others.Birling does not believe he has a responsibility to society, only to his family a man has to mind his deliver business and look after himself and his own (p.10). He is not upset, unlike Eric, at hearing the details of the girls death (p.12), which shows him to be a little heartless. He is suspiciously defensive when he thinks the Inspector is accusing him of causing it, and like Mrs Birling is relieved when he thinks the finger is no durable pointing at him. This is hypocritical because, as the Inspector says, the girls still dead, though (p.18). He also has double standards for he sees nothing strange in abstracted to protect Sheila from the unpleasantness of the girls life and death, yet feels no guilt at not having protected the girl herself.Crucially, Priestley undermines this self-important, complacent man, who believes his only responsibility is to his family, right at the start of the play. He is shown as short-sighted and wrongPredictionRealityWere in for a time of steadily increasing prosperityThe jetty Street Crash (1929) and the Great Depression in spite of appearance a generationThere isnt a chance of warWorld war within two years, with a second to follow within the aforementioned(prenominal) lifetimeIn 1940youll be living in a world thatll have disregarded all these Capital versus Labour agitationsThe General Strike (1926) and the continued rise of the Trade Union Movement.The Titanic unsinkable, absolutely unsinkableSS Titanic sinks on her maiden over voyageThis d ramatic irony at his expense encourages us to question how many of his other beliefs are correct Priestley, as a socialist, is not tender to what this capitalist believes.He also undermines Birlings relationship with his family, the only institution that Birling believes matters. In Act Two, both his children who learn from the Inspector in a way Birling never does behave badly in front of him (pp.32-33), and his heir Eric is later revealed as both an alcoholic and a thief. afterwards the Inspector has gone, Birling simply wants things to return to the way they were. He cannot understand Sheilas and Erics insistence that there is something to be learnt, and he is relieved and prideful when he feels that scandal has been avoided and everything is all right. Right up until the end, he claims that theres every excuse for what both your mother and I did it turned out unfortunately, thats all (p.57).Birling is not the cold and narrow-minded person that his wife is he simply believes in what he says. He is a restrict man, who is shown to be wrong about many things in the play it is the Birlings of the world whom Priestley feared in 1945 would not be willing or able to learn the lessons of the past, and so it is to the younger generation that Priestley hopefully looked insteadMrs BirlingPriestley describes her in the opening stage directions as a rather cold woman (p.1).She expects Sheila to make the same sacrifices in marriage that she had to (p.3) she has a clear sense of her duty within the family.