Mr Birling's ironies

GCSE · English Literature · AQA · P2.A.IC — *An Inspector Calls* (J. B. Priestley) — social responsibility, class, gender, time; the Birling family; Inspector Goole; cyclical structure and the final phone call

Question

How does Priestley use Arthur Birling to expose attitudes Priestley wants to criticise? (30 marks)

Mark scheme guidance:

AO2: Act 1 monologue — "Titanic... absolutely unsinkable"; "war's impossible"; "community and all that nonsense" — dramatic irony.
Capitalist self-righteousness — "a man has to look after himself and his own".
Refusal to learn — Act 3 "well, I see no reason... what about it?"
Comic but deadly — laughed at by audiences, but his economic philosophy underlies Eva's death.
Context: Edwardian capitalist confidence; 1945 audiences know the wars and crashes that followed.

30 marks · take your time before peeking.

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Generated by TopMyGrade AI · cross-check official sources before relying on the mark-scheme phrasing.