AIC themes-Class

Apart from Edna the maid, the cast of the play does not include any lower class characters. We see only the rich, upwardly mobile Birlings and the upper class Gerald Croft. Yet we learn a lot about the lower class as we hear of each stage in Eva's life and we see the attitude the Birlings had for them.

CharactersAttitudes to the lower class:Attitudes to the upper class: At the start of the play, this character was...To this character, Eva was...Mr Birlingkeen to be knighted to cement his hard-fought rise to the upper classcheap labourSheilahappy spending a lot of time in expensive shopssomeone who could be fired out of spiteGeraldprepared to marry Sheila, despite her lower social positiona mistress who could be discarded at willEricawkward about his 'public-school-and-Varsity' lifeeasy sex at the end of a drunken night outMrs Birlingsocially superior to her husband, and embarrassed at his gaffesa presumptuous upstart

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