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Q: Why are people so tired on April 1st?
A: Because they just finished a 31-day March :-)
The truth is, we really don't know where the tradition of playing pranks on people came from. There are a few theories floating around though:
· When the western world used the Julian calendar, the year began on March 25th because they celebrated the start of a new year with the start of spring. However since that fell in the Holy Week, the celebrated it on the first of April. However when we switched to the Gregorian calendar in the 1500s, we moved the New Year to the first of January. According to the most widely told story, those who still celebrated the New Year on April 1st were called April fools.
· The Encyclopedia of Religion and the Encyclopedia Britannica thinks that the timing of April Fool's Day is directly related to the arrival of Spring, when nature 'fools' humans with erratic weather.
· The Country Diary of Garden Lore has a theory that April Fools Day commemorates "the fruitless mission of the rook (the European crow) who was sent out in search of land from Noah's flood-surrounded ark."
So, on April 1st are you going to be the tricked or the trickster?
Wise men have never been deficient in their sayings on fools and foolishness.
They agree that it is okay to be foolish at times and in fact, every silly act
is a step to wisdom. The stupidity and idiotism has been criticized by many and
yet have attracted many others. Not a few people have claimed that everything
around us is a foolishness expressed and some have even advocated for them as
necessary evils. So don't be embarrassed when someone plays pranks on you and
calls you 'April Fool'. Here we have brought some famous sayings that capture
the spirit of human folly and April Fool's Day for you, so let's see what these
intellectuals had to say:
So,
rather than appear foolish afterward, I renounce seeming clever now.
~William of Baskerville in 'The Name of the Rose'~
A
fool sees not the same tree that a wise man sees.
~William Blake~
However
big the fool, there is always a bigger fool to admire him.
~Nicolas
Boileau-Despréaux~
You
will do foolish things, but do them with enthusiasm.
~Colette (1873 - 1954), in New York World-Telegram and Sun, 1961~
A
fool must now and then be right by chance.
~Cowper~
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness...
~Charles Dickens (1812 - 1870) in 'A Tale of Two Cities'~
A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines.
~Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803 - 1882) in 'Self-Reliance'~
If you want to improve, be content to be thought foolish and stupid.
~Epictetus (55 AD - 135 AD), Serendipity~
Talk sense to a fool and he calls you foolish.
~Euripides (484 BC - 406 BC)~
It is human nature to think wisely and act foolishly.
~Anatole France (1844 - 1924)~
Sometimes one likes foolish people for their folly,
better than wise people
for their wisdom.
~Elizabeth Gaskell~
Our wisdom comes from our experience,
and our experience comes from our foolishness.
~Sacha Guitry (1885 - 1957)~
Mix a little foolishness with your prudence: It's good to be silly at the right moment.
~Horace (65 BC - 8 BC)~
Perhaps we are wiser, less foolish and more far-seeing than we were two hundred years ago.
But we are still imperfect in all these things, and since the turn of the century it has been remarked
that neither wisdom nor virtue have increased as rapidly as the need for both.
~Joseph Wood Krutch (1893 - 1970)~
Those who wish to appear wise among fools, among the wise seem foolish.
~Quintilian, De Institutione Oratoria~
[Politicians] never open their mouths without subtracting from the sum of human knowledge.
~Thomas Reed~
He
who lives without folly isn't so wise as he thinks.
~François, Duc de
La Rochefoucauld~
The
more pity, that fools may not speak wisely what wise men do foolishly.
~William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616) in 'As You Like It'~
Always the dullness of the fool is the whetstone of the wits.
~William Shakespeare in 'As You Like It'~
You must not think me necessarily foolish because I am facetious,
nor will I consider you necessarily wise because you are grave.
~Sydney Smith (1771 - 1845)~
The
ultimate result of shielding men from the
effects of folly, is to fill the world with fools.
~Herbert Spencer~
It
is better to be a fool than to be dead.
~Stevenson~
No
man is so foolish but he may sometimes give another good counsel,
and no man so wise that he may not easily err if he takes no other counsel than his own.
He that is taught only by himself has a fool for a master.
~Hunter S. Thompson (1939)~
Let us be thankful for the fools.
But for them the rest of
us could not succeed.
~Mark Twain~
The first of April is the
day we remember
what we are the other 364 days of the year.
~Mark Twain~
Looking
foolish does the spirit good.
~John Updike~
The point of living and of being an optimist,
is to be foolish enough to believe the best is yet to come.
~Peter Ustinov (1921 - 2004)~
Foolish writers and readers are created for each other.
~Horace Walpole (1717 - 1797)~
April
Fool:
A
person successfully tricked on 1st April.
Fool:
A person who acts unwisely or imprudently, a stupid person, a jester/clown. One
who acts in a joking/teasing way.
Fool's Cap:
A cap with bells attached worn by jesters.
Act the Fool:
Behave in a silly
way.
Fool's Errand:
A fruitless
venture.
Fool's Gold:
Iron pyrites,
often mistaken for gold.
Fool's Paradise:
Happiness founded on a illusion.
Fool's Parsley:
A species of hemlock resembling parsley.
Playing the Fool:
To act like the
idiot or foolishly.
Tomfoolery:
Foolish behavior, nonsense.
Trompe-l'oeil:
A still-life painting, designed to give a illusion of reality. Literally
'deceives the eye'.
Foolery:
Foolish
behavior/a foolish act.
Foolhardy:
Rashly or
foolishly bold, reckless.
Labeling people stuck to old
traditions and customs as 'fools', sending them on 'fool errands' and hooking a
paper fish on their backs as a joke to depict them as 'April Fish' that
represented young and naïve fishes that are easily caught on the first day of
April were a common practice in Britain, France and Scotland in the 18th century
and were later introduced to the American colonies. With its spread and reach
all over the world, it has now acquired an international flavor.
The victims of these jokes are known as 'April Gowk'. Gowk is another name for
cuckoo bird. One can trace the continuance of these tricks in the popular 'Kick
Me' signs that are placed on the victim's butts unknowingly to make people
laugh.
Rome
Romans celebrate a similar festival by the name of 'Hilaria', when their God Attis was believed to have resurrected. This festival is also known as 'Roman Laughing Day' and will be celebrated on 25th March this year.
Portugal
Portuguese celebrate a similar festival as April Fool's Day on the Sunday and Monday before Lent season, where people throw flour at their friends.
India
India's festival 'Holi' that will be celebrated on 31st March 2005 is a Spring festival, where people play jokes on one another and smear each other's faces with colors and flower extracts.
Mexico
Mexican people celebrate a similar festival on December 28, which used to be a sad remembrance of the slaughter of the innocent children by the cruel King Herod. Later it evolved into lighter commemoration of children's pranks and trickery.
England
English people call the fooled victims as 'noodle', 'gobs' or 'gobby'. They play pranks only in the morning and it is considered bad luck to play pranks and practical jokes after noon.
In the Lake District, an April Fool is a - 'April noddy'.
April noddy's
past and gone,
You're the fool an' I'm none.
In Cornwall, an April Fool is a 'guckaw' or 'gowk', another word for cuckoo (a bird). If a child succeeded in 'taking in' another, he used to shout after him ~ "Fool, fool, the guckaw." On the other hand if the person resisited the trick, he would say ~ "The gowk and the titlene sit on a tree, You're a gowk as weel as me." Titlene refers to a hedge sparrow (a bird).
In Cheshire, an April Fool is a 'April gawby' or 'gobby or gob'.
In Christow in Devon, pranks had to be played in the afternoon. The day there was known as ‘Tail-pipe Day', because it was a custom to pin an inscription ‘Please kick me' to the coat-tails of an unsupecting victim.
Scotland
The day is known ‘Gowkie Day' or ‘Hunt the Gowk', though some
Scottish people
refer to April Fool's Day as Taily Day, the day on which especially the spoofs
involving the buttocks are put into action.
In the Orkney Isles, the pranks are transferred to 2nd April, which is known as ‘Tailing Day'.
France
An April Fool is called a 'fish' - 'poisson d'Avril' - and it is the custom to
send friends a dainty present made up in the form of a small fish.
Click here for some April Fool Gags
Click here for April Fool Trivia
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