In any audience after the first, there will doubtless be a
hundred degrees of knowledge and of ignorance. Many people will know
nothing at all about the play; some people will have seen or read it
yesterday, and will thus know all there is to know; while between these
extremes there will be every variety of clearness or vagueness of
knowledge. Some people will have read and remembered a detailed
newspaper notice; others will have read the same notice and forgotten
almost all of it. Some will have heard a correct and vivid account of
the play, others a vague and misleading summary. It would be absolutely
impossible to enumerate all the degrees of previous knowledge which are
pretty certain to be represented in an average audience; and to which
degree of knowledge is the playwright to address himself? If he is to
have any firm ground under his feet, he must clearly adopt the only
logical course, and address himself to a spectator assumed to have no
previous knowledge whatever.
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