J.B. Priestley, the son of a schoolmaster, was born in Bradford in 1894. After leaving Belle Vue High School, he spent some time as a junior clerk in a wool office. (A lively account of his life at this period may be found in his volume of reminiscences,
Margin Released.) He joined the army in 1914, and in 1919, on receiving an ox-officers’ grant, went to Trinity Hall, Cambridge. In 1922, after refusing several academic posts, and having already published one book and contributed critical articles and essays to various reviews, he went to London. There he soon made a reputation as an essayist and critic. he began writing novels, and with his third and fourth novels,
The Good Companions and
Angel Pavement, he scored a great success and established an international reputation. This was enlarged by the plays he wrote in the 1930s and 1940s, some of these, notably
Dangerous Corner,
Time and the Conways and
An Inspector Calls, having been translated and produced all over the world. During the Second World War he was exceedingly popular as a broadcaster. Since the war his most important novels have been
Bright Day,
Festival at Farbridge,
Lost Empires and
The Image Men, and his more ambitious literary and social criticism can be found in
Literature and Western Man,
Man and Time and
Journey Down a Rainbow, which he wrote with his wife, Jacquetta Hawkes, a distinguished archaeologist and a well-established writer herself. It was in this last book that Priestley coined the term ‘Admass’, now in common use. Among his latest books are
Victoria’s Heydey (1972),
Over the Long High Wall (1972),
The English (1973),
Outcries and Asides, a collection of essays (1974),
A Visit to New Zealand (1974),
The Carfitt Crisis (1975),
Particular Pleasures (1975),
Found, Lost, Found, or the English Way of Life (1976),
The Happy Dream (1976),
English Humour (1976) and an autobiography,
Instead of the Trees (1977). In 1977 J. B. Priestley received the Order of merit. He died in 1984.
'We don't live alone ... We are responsible for each other'
A policeman interrupts a rich family's dinner to question them about the suicide of a young working-class girl. As their guilty secrets are gradually revealed over the course of the evening, 'An Inspector Calls', J. B. Priestley's most famous play, shows us the terrible consequences of poverty and inequality. The other powerful plays in this collection - 'Time and the Conways', 'I Have Been Here Before' and 'The Linden Tree' - explore time, fate, free will and the effects of war.
'A vastly talented and exceptionally versatile and wise writer' Iris Murdoch
'Priestley was volcanic, fertile ... and never dull' Anthony Burgess
If you enjoyed An Inspector Calls, you might like Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman, also available in Penguin Modern Classics.
