preview

Class Differences in Blood Brothers, by Willy Russell Essay

Better Essays

Willy Russell creates a play to show us the class differences that existed in Liverpool in the 1980’s. He does this by showing us the contrasting lives of the two boys and their mothers. Mrs Lyons has an easy life and Mrs Johnston has a hard life and has to work hard to earn a living. The same applies to the boys as Mickey has the hard life and Eddie has the easy life. Willy Russell also shows us that education, living conditions, housing and wealth can be affected as a direct result of your class and social background. This meant that the people from working class backgrounds had a harder life because they didn’t have the same opportunities. During the 1980’s a lot of people were made redundant because mills and factories closed …show more content…

She is trying to earn a living as a cleaner which is a poor job and she is struggling because a cleaner can’t afford to feed seven mouths.
Finally Russell shows us that she is in such a desperate situation that she ends up giving her child away. This makes you feel sorry for her because she is on her own and has to cope with everything herself.
This tells us that because of her social background her life chances are limited. Russell shows us she is uneducated through her superstition. Today if a woman is left alone then she gets help from the government through income support, child benefit and other kinds of financial backing. But at this time the government didn’t offer financial help to the people so many people like Mrs Johnston suffered. But life is still not equal because many people still can’t afford designer clothes or afford to send their children to private school.

This has changed now because then the government didn’t provide any financial help for single mums. Also at this time there were high levels of redundancies and unemployment. This meant it was harder for her to get a job and provide for her family. When she says ‘Next week
I’ll be earning, there’ll be loads of stuff to eat’. This suggests that she is looking for work to make her life better. At the time this was written, people lived in overcrowded homes in the slums of the cities. This meant that living conditions were poor

Get Access