An Inspector Calls was the title of the most popular of J.B.Priestley’s plays, which are not generally popular today, probably because they are quite philosophical and not merely entertaining. In his closing speech, the inspector is quite profound:
“We don’t live alone. We are members of one body. We are responsible for each other. And I tell you that the time will soon come when if men will not learn that lesson, then they will be taught it in fire and blood and anguish. Good night.”
The play premiered in Russia in 1945, although the action takes place in one day in the English Midlands in 1912. It can be seen as a social comment on the attitudes that led up to the destruction of the two world wars. The above quote also seems prescient today, when crystallised attitudes and separation are potentially leading us once again into peril.
This post was inspired by Paul Kieniewicz’s review of
‘Time and the Rose Garden’, by Anthony Peake,
which is about the works of Priestley.
Photo of Priestley statue in Bradford By Chemical Engineer,
via Wikimedia Commons