Charlie Douglas

VP Corporate Affairs @Comcast for Digital Equity, Internet Essentials, Military Affairs, and Accessibility. #iworkforComcast

[Charlie Douglas @CGDouglas]

Roughly 43 million Americans either can't read or can only read at a third grade level. This presents a huge barrier to those trying to build a better life. Few are making this point as well as Beyond Literacy. Proud to serve on its board. https://t.co/FVB25nocsz

[Charlie Douglas @CGDouglas]

What an incredible experience! https://t.co/bAR9KNDoXJ

[Charlie Douglas @CGDouglas]

Amazing how creative humans can be. https://t.co/nYRFlv0vNY

[Charlie Douglas @CGDouglas]

Firearm fatalities increased by 87.1% over a 10-year period, from 1,311 deaths in 2011 to 2,590 deaths in 2021, the AAP found, beating out car accidents as the leading cause of death of children and teenagers in the U.S. https://t.co/CP0nAFICk5

[Charlie Douglas @CGDouglas]

This is also a movie I need to see. https://t.co/iQBuMIIiIF

[Charlie Douglas @CGDouglas]

US GDP grew 2.5% in 2023, significantly outpacing other developed economies, according to a Jan report from the IMF, which also projected the US will hold that lead in 2024. Canada and Germany lagged with 2023 GDP growth at 1.1% and negative 0.3%, respectively. #winning

[Charlie Douglas @CGDouglas]

Philanthropist MacKenzie Scott donates $640M to nonprofits, including some in Philadelphia including @BeyondLiteracy https://t.co/liRWekq0Nd

[Charlie Douglas @CGDouglas]

Excited to share this amazing news about @BeyondLiteracy https://t.co/7MMQX9dZm6

[Charlie Douglas @CGDouglas]

@SundaeDivine This is accurate.

[Charlie Douglas @CGDouglas]

@gregbrown Same. And I think about this all the time...

[Charlie Douglas @CGDouglas]

@Dylarama_ Me too. Please.

[Charlie Douglas @CGDouglas]

“This is a great victory for every woman who stands up when she’s been knocked down and a huge defeat for every bully who has tried to keep a woman down,” Ms. Carroll said in a statement, thanking her lawyers effusively.

[Charlie Douglas @CGDouglas]

For anyone who wasn't an English major, this is an infuriating example of something called, "irony of situation." The director and star of Barbie did not get #Oscar nominations, but Ryan Gosling did? And the movie is ABOUT patriarchy? No words. https://t.co/cnQpknPRvv

[Charlie Douglas @CGDouglas]

Charlie Munger: These 'basic rules' made me successful in life—'with Warren Buffett, I had all 3' @CNBC https://t.co/ta9xWXrluU

[Charlie Douglas @CGDouglas]

WHERE ARE ALL THE UNPUBLISHED JD SALINGER NOVELS? Can someone please ask Matt Salinger nicely please to put his dad's work out into the world? https://t.co/2pwqYtjno3

[Charlie Douglas @CGDouglas]

We need accountability and change in Maine. Most of Maine’s delegation won’t even talk about an assault weapons ban https://t.co/8d7VYimIxU

[USA TODAY @USATODAY]

The youth literacy rate has been steadily increasing since 1975, UNESCO data shows but women worldwide and US Southerners are still lagging. https://t.co/fevC1lb4fr

[Charlie Douglas @CGDouglas]

@sherman4949 Really interesting and well researched Alex. Go Celtics!

[Charlie Douglas @CGDouglas]

@alexgarcia_atx Brilliant!

[Nathan Baugh @nathanbaugh27]

In ancient Greece, 2 forms of story dominated:

Tragedy & Comedy

Aristotle’s Poetics gives us a detailed breakdown of the 6 elements of Tragedy.

But he highlights 2 as far more critical than the rest:

1. Plot

A fan of metaphor, Aristotle compares plot to the untying of a knot.

The knot should get tied tighter and tighter until the climax of the story (or peripeteia).

Then, its complexity and open loops unravel as the story comes to its end.

But what makes the best plots?

For Aristotle, the most gripping plots contain surprises.

Surprises that are hard to predict looking forward but obvious looking back.

He says the best surprises are caused by peripeteia — reversal of fortune — or anagnorisis — discovery.

2. Character

Aristotle lays out three keys to great characters:

• Your hero must go from relatively noble and happy to struggle and misery

• The audience’s pity and fear are aroused more when family members attack each other than strangers

• The hero must have positive qualities, or at least a measure of competence, for the audience to care about them

George RR Martin must’ve read these before writing GoT.

If your audience doesn’t care about your characters, you don’t have a story.

Aristotle put the six elements in priority order in Poetics. These are the other four (still in order):

• Thought
• Diction
• Song
• Spectacle

My thoughts:

2500 years have passed and the same elements make great stories stand apart.

Stories are about people, what happens to those people, and what changes within those people as a result of what happens.

It’s a shame two-thirds of his writing has been lost to history.

“The first essential, the life and soul, so to speak, of a story, is the Plot.” — Aristotle

For more on storytelling, follow me @nathanbaugh27.

[Charlie Douglas @CGDouglas]

@blakeaburge I would have guessed the word was luck. Oh well.