 Hello and welcome to our summary video on an inspector calls. Now make this video for two reasons The first is for students who have been following my entire course now so far We've looked at a very detailed overview of the play as well as read through each of the three acts in detail And so this video is really useful in tying together everything in terms of taking a step back and understanding the plot more broadly The different themes the genres and characters. However I also made this video for some students who've joined this course and they don't necessarily have the luxury of time In other words, you don't necessarily have the time to go through the play in detail as well as other aspects of the course And you really just need to get a quick overview of what happens The key quotations to remember and then jump straight into our following video, which will be the exam practice Now if that's what you need you've come to the right place So with that further ado, let's get started now Let's begin with just a general broad summary and overview of the plot now just to recap Essentially the play begins with Sheila and Gerald having an engagement and of course in terms of the lighting It's very pink very soft and of course this shows that they all wear rose tinted glasses as a whole They are an upper middle-class family very detached from what's going on in an audience society and Sheila is presented as really childish She's very childlike and she's really excitable with regards to her engagement Then essentially we have Mr. Berling who we realize actually has got a lot to benefit from this wedding Between Gerald Croft and his daughter Sheila Berling. Gerald Croft comes from a very aristocratic family And hence this wedding will essentially be a business merger between the Berling family Which is a smaller company and the Croft family who run a larger and more competitive family Now Mr. Berling set both Gerald and Eric aside They go to his drawing room and he discusses essentially this idea that he doesn't really believe in social responsibility And this idea that rich people should look out for poorer people Now as the play progresses essentially this reverie and this happiness is interrupted by an inspector an inspector called Inspector Ball Who interrupts this happiness and comes in and at first the Berlings try to intimidate him Especially Mr. Berling who tries to use his social standing and social status to essentially intimidate the inspector to leave However, the inspector reveals that a young woman named essentially Eva Smith But later on Daisy Renton died by committed suicide and they are all Implicated in this death in other words that all held responsible now the inspector starts off with Mr. Berling And it turns out that Eva Smith essentially used to work for his factory She tried to get better pay because she was underpaid as well as all the other workers in his factory She tried to organize them to ask Mr. Berling for better pay He fired her and treated her essentially as cheap labor and he's implicated in her death because essentially She didn't have any kind of social stability or any kind of financial stability After being kicked out from her workplace for simply asking for just better pay Which is just a humane thing for Mr. Berling to do However, then he moves on to Sheila. So it's not really Mr. Berling that's responsible for this death We find that Eva Smith was luckily able to find another job in a shop called Millwards Which is where both Sheila and her mother shop in and this is ladies of leisure who go in and shop in this shop However, Sheila she tries on a dress and she becomes really annoyed with herself because she doesn't look very beautiful in this dress She notices Eva Smith and another shop assistant smirking at her and Essentially, she decides to use her power and her influence as someone who supports the shop and has a patron to get Eva fired So of course Eva had less options. She goes from not having a job with Mr. Berling She finds a job fortunately and she's then fired from this job simply because one of the people who is Really in a very powerful position like Sheila decides she doesn't take like into her and then she's fired So of course Eva Smith doesn't really have any options She may have killed herself here and of course Sheila learns her role in this However, the inspector then moves on to Gerald now We had found out that Gerald had Mysteriously disappeared the previous summer before this engagement now we find out the reason for why Gerald disappeared It turns out he was having an affair with Sheila or rather, sorry He was having an affair with Daisy Renton This is now Eva Smith who decided to because she didn't have any options and any job opportunities She decides to become a night worker in other words a prostitute now She meets Gerald who takes a liking to her and essentially Gerald has an affair with her But also he decides to financially support her however that comes to an end when he has to Essentially leave and he has to go back to basically living with his normal family and to push forward that engagement and of course at this point Maybe Daisy Renton who formerly was known as Eva Smith may have felt that her options even as a night worker were running out Now we then move on to Mrs. Burling now the inspector turns to Mrs. Burling and it turns out that Eva Smith now Daisy Renton became pregnant We don't yet quite know who caused this pregnancy however She approaches Mrs. Burling who we learn is in charge of the Brummel women's charity Organisations is a charity that's supposed to help working-class women who are maybe pregnant They don't necessarily have any financial support She's supposed to be the chair of this charity and she's supposed to be helping working-class women like Daisy Renton Now Daisy Renton when she presents herself She presents herself as a Burling and we find out of course that this is a hint that not only is she pregnant But she's pregnant by Eric's child now Mrs. Burling who's afraid of the scandal the social scandal This might cause to their family decides to use her influence to have any form of financial support Refused to Daisy Renton and she's therefore turned away So maybe at this stage could Daisy Renton have killed herself as a result of Mrs. Burling's Selfishness and of course not only has she killed herself She's killed the child within her and of course the final person who shows us who's the father of the child is Eric Except the inspector turns to Eric and it turns out that Eric not only is an alcoholic But he has a taste in women and he meets Daisy Renton who of course we know is a night worker He meets her before she fell pregnant and it turns out that not only does he have an affair with her She falls pregnant and he used to steal from his father in order to support Daisy Renton but once Daisy Renton found out that he was stealing in order to give her essentially an allowance She would she did the moral thing and she rejected any more money And of course Eric Falty couldn't do anything and so their affair ended However, of course, we then know that she was pregnant their affair ends and she tries to go to Mrs. Burling to get some help She runs out of options and ultimately because she has no options. She's now pregnant She ultimately feels she has no opportunities and she decides to kill herself So essentially all of these people have a part to play now how the play ends is that the inspector Then leaves them all by this stage. The happiness has been completely destroyed Effectively, they're all really really upset and especially Sheila and Eric are really moved by this story of Eva Smith Slash Daisy Renton. They already appear to want to be better people However, it's really interesting to see the difference in their opinions with the mother and father Both of them actually want to see how they can cover up their role They want to see what can be done Of course, also Gerald Croft appears rather than Sheila and Eric who are the younger ones rather than feeling the same sentiments as them Actually, he also wants to see how he can cover this up. So he goes off to the police station finds out that no inspector go Exists he comes back is really triumphant. He tells this to the Berlings both Sybil and Arthur Burling are really pleased Because now they know that no scandal will fall upon them. However, both Eric and Sheila still feel responsible They know that someone has been killed here someone has committed suicide because actually how could they all be confessing to something and There's too much coincidence between the people who they are confessing to have hurt versus someone not really existing So essentially we find that there's a divide between Gerald on one side as well as the older Berlings Versus the younger Berlings. This is Eric and Sheila Ultimately whilst Mr. And Mrs. Berling are really happy They then get another phone call and they find out that someone has died in the infirmary and a police officer is coming to ask some questions So essentially it repeats and it goes back to where it started off from So that's the plot in detail So now let's talk about the genre and the genre is really straightforward Essentially, this is a play it belongs to the drama genre and essentially this play is really really powerful It's Priestley's way of making a social critique It was written after the second world war in 1945 which ended in 1945 And this is Priestley's way of essentially saying that it's really important for England not to have a repeat of the Social divides that had been seen during the Victorian era as well as Edwardian England So do remember that this genre is a drama Now let's talk about context and do remember that context is really important for your AO4 marks Context means what was happening at the time of writing What are the surrounding issues at the time of writing that Priestley wants our attention to be drawn to Now when it comes to context the first thing to remember is to do with when the play is supposed to be set in Which is of course very different to when it was written. So as I mentioned it was written after the second world war However, the play is meant to be set in the Edwardian period This is the period right after the Victorian era in the early 1900s up until the start of the first world war So you can roughly say Edwardian England was between 1900s all the way to 1914 and this was essentially a really deeply divided society There was a massive divide between the majority poor working class people like Eva Smith and the very very few Upper class and upper middle class people like the Berlin family who really benefited of the labor and of the hard work Of the industrial workers who had pushed for the industrial revolution But they didn't necessarily benefit from any of this wealth Now the other contextual factor to remember of course is a social class divide So again as I've mentioned before there was a massive divide between the very few who were really wealthy and who had lots of Opportunities versus the vast majority of people who were poor and they lacked opportunities And as we can see from Eva Smith and Daisy Renton their options narrowed and narrowed and narrowed until they had nothing else to do Ultimately this could cause suicide The other key contextual factor is to do with unequal workplaces. So of course always remember that UK and England's industrial growth was powered by the industrial revolution This means there were lots of factories that had opened in the 17 and 1800s Which powered the growth of the UK However, a lot of these factory workers who worked in really unsafe conditions really unsanitary conditions a lot of them died Very young. They also were paid very little and there was a lot of inequality Not only between what they would expect to pay but even inequality amongst the workers So women and children were paid far less than male workers And of course that's why priestly chose a woman as the character that dies Now the final contextual factor is to do with gender roles and this is especially shown Through Eva Smith slash Daisy Renton as well as Sheila and her mother Now when you're thinking about Edwardian England women did not really have that many opportunities Not only did working women have to accept very low pay and very unequal pay But upper-class women were essentially seen as the properties of their husbands So do remember that this is before the suffragette movement. The suffragette movement was a movement for equality between Women and men when it came to their voting rights prior to the suffragettes Essentially gaining women the right to vote women were considered property of men And of course this is highlighted through the marriage between Gerald Croft and Sheila Burling Mr. Burling actually is the one who stands most to benefit from this He's using his daughter as an object in order to essentially arrange a marriage to someone who he can profit from As a businessman So do remember in terms of gender roles if you're a woman who belonged to the upper-class section of society You were essentially property of your father and you were expected to engage in arranged marriages And you were expected to essentially be happy with your lot However, if you were a working-class woman, you really did not have very many options You were always often in a very insecure financial position And if you had to work you would essentially have to put up with very unequal workplace pay Now when it comes to themes before you go into characters and quotes There are four themes you need to be remembering when you are answering questions And so remember when it comes to exam questions, you either get a character related question or a theme related question So let's go through the themes. The first is to do with social responsibility And of course social responsibility also ties in contextually to social class Now as I mentioned during Edwardian England The English class structure was very unequal and essentially what priestly Is using this play for is to say that and to show that upper-class people have a social responsibility They have a duty to poorer people to essentially not only support charities But also they have a duty to pay them better in the workplaces. So that's the theme of social responsibility The rich have a duty to the poor to improve their working conditions But also more generally improve and minimize the social divides The other key theme is that to do with age and this is highlighted In the different attitudes that the older berlings have versus the younger berlings on the other hand Now what priestly felt was that young people are the most malleable They're the ones who are able to change in terms of their mindset and their mentality Whilst the older generation is perhaps more set in their ways And he shows this through the end of the play whereby when they learned that Inspectable doesn't necessarily exist the older berlings. So mr. Berling and mrs. Berling They're actually really jubilant. They're celebrating that they don't exist And they therefore don't have to worry about changing anything And they definitely don't have to worry about the reputation They don't necessarily think that actually from what they've learned about Eva Smith and Daisy Renton They should help others. In fact, all they do is just care about themselves Therefore the attitudes are really rigid and they're okay with the social divides In contrast, however, we find that Sheila and Eric actually want to see a social change They don't want to hear about more women like Eva Smith and Daisy Renton But even men They don't want to hear that these people who are in the working class position are dying Because needlessly they are dying because of unequal pay terrible living conditions and so on so they actually want to see social changes The other theme is that to do with gender and this is obviously highlighted through the roles that Eva Sheila as well as her mother play So of course there's unequal gender roles between the men and the women the men Have the opportunity to do exactly what they want, especially upper class aristocratic men like Gerald However, women like Sybil and Sheila essentially have to accept their lot and definitely women like Eva Not only do they need to accept their lot actually even if the lot is taking away That's that's how it goes for working class women. So in terms of gender Essentially priestly wanted to highlight and draw our attention to just how terrible The treatment of women was during Edwardian England Now the final theme of course is that of class and what Priestly is trying to draw attention to is how unequal class divisions ultimately does result not only in poverty But it also contributes to the death of millions of people who don't need to die If only we change these divisions and we create a more equitable and more fair society So now let's finally move on to key quotes to remember for each character So of course when it comes to key quotes to remember these are the main characters that you need to consider So of course, let's first start off with the inspector So in terms of the quotations to remember for the inspector The first is when he accuses Sheila and he says you pass the annoyance On to her and of course this is just showing how the upper class people especially upper class women Essentially they treat working class individuals as disposable But also they have so much disproportionate power relative to them The other key quotation to remember is when he speaks to mr. Burling and he says public men have responsibilities This is tying in of course the theme of social responsibility the idea that the welfare you are the more you have to give back to society The other key quotation that the inspector says is the millions of Eva smiths and john smiths This is to say that actually Eva smith is not an anomaly. She's not just an exception There's so many women like her and so many men in her position who are working class who have no opportunities And this leads needlessly to their deaths and we need to do something about this The other key characters to remember in terms of quotation is mr. Burling and the first quotation is when he says The titanic absolutely unthinkable. This shows just how detached socially he is from others He's so myopic. So he has my opr that's spelt my opia That essentially means that he's completely detached from society He doesn't really understand what's going on in the normal average working class household And this shows that of course this there's a lot of irony here because we know that the titanic did sink So he was so detached from what's going on socially He didn't even know that there was going to be a war that was brewing and of course the first world war also did happen The other key quotations to remember for mr. Burling is when he's described as a Hard-headed practical man of business and he calls himself that and again, this just shows that he is very much solely focused on profits and solely focused on greedy profits And this is to the this is against the idea of social responsibility So of course you can tie that into social responsibility and of course class So his idea of being a hard-headed practical man of business means that he is contributed to class divisions The other key character to remember key quotations for is of course mr. Burling The first is when she says gulls of that class and this is the term that she uses to justify Why she refused daisy rent in any kind of help She doesn't believe that women who are working class deserve any type of charity The second quotation to remember for mrs. Burling is I used my influence to have it refused And this is what she says to justify essentially turning away a pregnant daisy renton Before she committed suicide The other character to remember of course is Sheila and she gets really upset at her father and she says these girls aren't cheap labor This is another way of essentially questioning why he sees everyone as a business asset And she is essentially saying that people like Eva Smith, but even more broadly working class people are not disposable objects They are human beings The other quotation from Sheila is you don't seem to have learned anything. She says this towards the end of the play when The older Burlings as well as Gerald Croft Essentially are really really pleased and really happy that the inspector doesn't exist However, she's saying hang on a minute guys We need to learn from this experience that we need to do something about helping people who are less fortunate than us Now the other quotation and the other character of course to remember is Eric And the first quotation is when he talks to his mother and he says you killed them both He's essentially saying that his mother is responsible not only for keeling daisy renton But also for killing their children and of course this Implicates her and shows that she has not taken any form of social responsibility But also she's a criminal in what she's done to daisy renton The other quotation from Eric to remember is when he says what we did to her matters Now this shows that he's completely changed as a person He's gone from being a really self-absorbed alcoholic to someone who actually cares about others Now the other character to remember the final character in terms of quotations is Gerald The first quote is when he says we're respectable citizens and not criminals And of course this is said with irony Actually, this is the opposite based on what his family does based on what he does to daisy renton And certainly what mr. Mrs. Berlin do to daisy and either smith They are really criminal their behavior is criminal. And so this is a dramatic irony on priestly's part The second quotation to remember from Gerald is when he says I was sorry for her and this is to justify His funding of daisy renton when he was having an affair with her Actually this shows that he's trying to have some kind of charity But it's a false charity because it wasn't for free And of course it still shows that he was quite selfish in the way he treated daisy renton If he knew that she really needed help from him So that's all in terms of revising inspector courts and I hope you found this summary video useful Thank you so much for listening