<P> The play is a three - act drama , which takes place on a single night in April 1912 , focusing on the prosperous upper middle - class Birling family , who live in a comfortable home in the fictional town of Brumley , `` an industrial city in the north Midlands '' . The family is visited by a man calling himself Inspector Goole , who questions the family about the suicide of a young working - class woman , Eva Smith ( also known as Daisy Renton ) . The family is interrogated and revealed to have been responsible for the young woman 's exploitation , abandonment and social ruin , effectively leading to her death . Long considered part of the repertory of classic `` drawing room '' theatre , the play has also been hailed as a scathing critique of the hypocrisies of Victorian / Edwardian English society and as an expression of Priestley 's socialist political principles . The play is studied in many schools in the UK as one of the prescribed texts for the English Literature GCSE ( General Certificate of Secondary Education ) examination . </P>
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a scathing critique of the hypocrisies of Victorian / Edwardian English society