J.B.Priestley’s play, An Inspector Calls :: English Literature

An Inspector CallsDiscuss the character of Sheila in An Inspector CallsSheila Birling is the daughter of Mr Arthur Birling and Mrs SybilBirling. She has a younger brother called Eric Birling. Sheila is inher early twenties and is in a high social class. However they aresaid to be nouveux rishe because her father wasnt born into a pissed family, he made his own way through life to be were he is.This, in a way, justifies the status and manners his children andhimself. What I mean by this is that he hasnt got the sophisted phraseology we would expect a man in his position would have. Sheilaand Eric also seem to have this lack of manners and sophistecatedvocabulary.Dont be an assSheila says this to Eric at the table. As we can see this is quite amodern vocabulary and not proper of a rich family.This contrastsgrately with the behaviour and vacabulary of her mother.Sheila shows herself as an impressionable girl. She is unforced toaccept new ideas and concepts. She has an honest and attra ctivecharacter and shows quite a different character than that of herparents. She is not so cold-blooded. This makes her able to changeher attitude as the play progresses.I think Sheila represents two of the deadly sins. She represents envyin the shop where she went to buy the dress. She envied the way Evalooked in the dress. She also represents wrath (great anger).. Shrepresents this loosely in her behaviour at Milwards.Sheila, before the inspector comes, is very immature and quitenave as well.. She seems to say rather immature things especially toEric victimisation slang phrases such as Youre squiffy. This shows herlittle consciousness towards the power Gerald has over her. Shedoesnt seem to realise that she is using slang vocabulary infront ofher fianc which belongs to a high status family.Early in the play she shows herself to be a very dependent girl,looking to her parents for most decisions that need to be made. Her pairing to Gerald was a marriage of businesses, as well as love. Idoubt Sheila saw this at the time, or just ignored this fact.Sheila is also quite a spoilt girl since she has everything she wants.This is shown in her attitude in Milwards. Here she shows that sherelies on others and cares little for the lower classes. I thinkPriestly chooses to represent her like this at first so that we canrealise the big change she makes as the play progresses.