Origins: Easter and April Fool's Day

 Easter is what’s known in Catholicism as a moveable feast—that is, it doesn’t occur on the same date every year.  This religious holiday had been observed on different dates and days of the week until the Council of Nicaea in the year 325 decreed it would be observed on the first Sunday after the first full moon on or after the vernal equinox (the first day of spring.)  So it never falls earlier than March 22 nor later than April 25.

 Easter is the most important holy day (or holi-day) in Christianity, commemorating the resurrection of Christ after his crucifixion.  In my Catholic schooling in the 1950s, it was the end of a drama that began four weeks before with the beginning of Lent, with the liturgy supplying the events and observances between. 

As for the timing of the observance and even the name, the early Church superimposed it on the Saxon festival to the goddess of spring, whose name was Eostre.  Some theorize that persecuted Christians celebrating their holy day at the same time as Eostre made them less conspicuous. 

 In any case, most of the other familiar elements of Easter echo the fertility rites and symbolism of the original holiday, like the rabbits (as in “breeding like,” the hare was the animal associated with the goddess Eostre in Saxon lore) and eggs (an ancient custom of exchanging actual eggs turned to chocolate in the nineteenth century.) 

 Some Easter eggs are worth more than others, like the gold and diamond décor of the Faberge egg, or the decorated eggs in Germany inscribed with a child’s date of birth, which functioned legally as a birth certificate in the 1880s. 

My Italian grandparents had various Easter traditions involving pastries and baked goods, but for the first time this Easter I had a Hot Cross bun, courtesy of our local Quaker meeting, of which Margaret is a member.  This bun tradition goes back to the Saxon feast of Eostre.  When the Catholic Church absorbed it, the bun indeed carried the design of a cross. 

Because of this year's calendar, Easter was celebrated just one day before another spring holiday.

April Fool's Day

 April Fool’s Day is always April 1, and that's a key to its specific origins. It has roots in many cultures that reach as far back as history goes, and probably farther. Part of its complex pedigree is a meaningful relationship to the American Bill of Rights.  But most directly, it's about New Years.

The historical roots of the day include ancient festivals of spring which often had some component of comedy, trickery and release from ordinary rules, which in the western world at least usually included orgies of gluttony, drunkenness and sexual licentiousness.

 The probable direct ancestor of April Fool's Day is more specific—when France adopted the Gregorian calendar in the sixteenth century, New Year's moved from April 1 to January 1. But old habits are hard to break, especially if they began  in 45 B.C., when Julius Caesar set up the old Julian calendar. Some gullible Parisians were tricked by clever neighbors into celebrating New Year's on what was now the wrong day.

Out of this was born the classic cry, April Fish! Which is something that did not cross the Atlantic when the calendar was later changed in America. No one is quite sure what the fish thing is about, but the day is still celebrated that way in France.  Still, the first April Fool's Day jest was probably, "Happy New Year!"

But the more important aspect of this history relates to the tradition of the licensed fool. For centuries, most European and some Asian countries had them, popularly known as court jesters. From imperial Rome through the medieval period and the Renaissance, official fools were not only a popular and well known presence in royal courts, but for part of that time were also employed by cities, clergy and wealthy families.

Their duties ranged from song and dance to pratfalls and acrobatics, ribaldry and general foolishness. At times no fashionable dinner party was complete without a fool hired to insult the guests. But the key element of the "allowed fool" was his (and occasionally, her) freedom to do and especially to say anything to anyone.

The official fool also has roots in an aspect of the aforementioned festivals, which featured a Lord of Misrule— a commoner who took on the trappings of the king or bishop or town mayor for a day. As far back as the tenth century, these became elaborate performances, mixing entertainment with social comment, and topical plays or burlesque sermons that satirized the real rulers of state and church, who had to at least pretend to enjoy it. These events became hugely popular, but nobody was fool enough to criticize the powerful if there were going to be reprisals. So the tradition included immunity for the fool.

When kings hired permanent court jesters, political satire as well as pointed personal remarks were part of their repertoire, and the tradition of immunity came with them. Archibald Armstrong, one of England's last and most political jesters replied, "No one has ever heard of a fool being hanged for talking, but many dukes have been beheaded for their insolence." So it happened that the only people in Europe with the absolute right of free speech were kings and queens, and fools.

This fact was not lost on others who were agitating for that kind of freedom for all. The original document of the Magna Carta, England's first great challenge to absolute royal power in 1215, was decorated with the figure of a court jester. From the late 15th century until well into the 17th, "societies of fools" flourished in France, composed of young men who criticized the government and agitated for freedom while wearing the traditional court jester motley.

America never had court jesters, though some of its first expressions of freedom and identity were in the foolery tradition, from the burlesque of the Boston Tea Party (a bunch of Anglos badly costumed as Indians who struck a blow for political independence by dumping tea into cold water) to some early symbols such as Yankee Doodle and Uncle Sam. 

 "Yankee" was a British ethnic slur which New Englanders turned into a badge of honor, and Yankee Doodle Dandy was a clown figure (what else can you say about a guy who sticks a feather in his cap and calls it macaroni?) made immortal in the song sung at key moments in the American Revolution, including at the British surrender. A similar figure, a Yankee "wise fool" stock character popular in early American stage comedies, was a source for Uncle Sam.

Americans also pride themselves on being straightforward, so there's a companion tradition of mistrusting the tricky. But today our Zeitgeist depends so heavily on some forms of deceit--spin, disinformation, oversimplifying and the straight-faced lie--that selectively moralizing about other forms rings hollow.  Injustice wears clothes of obscurant nomenclature, and success by any means necessary is our guiding morality. Mendacity is a trick of power.

The heart of the fool's relation to free speech is speaking truth to power. For awhile we may have thought that serious journalism was going to do that, but when the most powerful owns the most presses, and the line between editorial and advertising becomes more and more imaginary, it's looking like a piquant hope.

The rich and powerful can easily ridicule the countrified (the original meaning of "clown") and unsophisticated, but the figure of the fool deflects the ridicule back upon the pretentious and corrupt. Freedom to criticize the powerful is at the heart of both the fool tradition and free speech.

The pretensions of power are automatic, perhaps the inevitable product of consciousness equipped with opposable thumbs. Our particular social systems depend on some forms of deceit while moralizing about others. Historians are dishonored for missing quotation marks, but not if the history they write is dishonest bunk. Paradox or irony shade into hypocrisy as we deny freedoms in the name of protecting freedom.

Today April Fool's Day is just about our only nod to this tradition. You can play tricks on people any day of the year, but the idea is that on this day, you are allowed to.  But since most of today’s jokes will be made online, it looks pretty much like every day on the Internet, where intentional misinformation is standard. This is the scarier side of information without authority, and often without conscience.

Since laughter seems to override anger, wit is often its own protection, at least temporarily. The cosmos itself seems designed with persistent uncertainties, which is perhaps why many religious and cultural traditions make the trickster a major myth.

Historically and perhaps in practice, the freedom of the fool makes way for freedom of speech in all its aspects. Humor often seems to make the truth clearer and perhaps easier to acknowledge. We have to be tricked into seeing what we would rather not see. We can have tricksters without truth, and in our entertainment-dominated society we mostly do. But rarely can we fallible humans have truth without tricksters.

A Great Year for Fools

by William S. Kowinski

April Fool's Day is the Rodney Dangerfield of holidays: it gets no respect. But maybe it should this time, because it's been a great year for Fools.

For instance, best-selling author Al Franken, who inaugurated Air America Radio, a liberal talk radio network, on April Fool's Day Eve (March 31.)
Along with fellow best-sellers Michael Moore, Molly Ivins and Bill Maher, he made humor a political weapon, and his outspoken outrage towards the Bush administration helped to set the tone for the Democratic primary campaign. It's hard to imagine Howard Dean or even the later rhetoric of John Kerry would have been possible without these Fools paving the way.

(For the uninitiated, Al Franken's "Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right" was the second best-selling political book last year(to Hillary's), ranking 21st in sales overall. After leading the list in 2002, Michael Moore's "Stupid White Men (And Other Sorry Excuses for the State of the Nation)" remained in the top 100 last year, and has been followed by his current best-seller, "Dude, Where's My Country." Molly Ivins' "Bushwhacked" took up where "Shrub" left off as mordantly witty chronicles of George W. Bush (both books cowritten with Lou Dubose). Together with Bill Maher's best seller "When You Ride Alone You Ride with bin Laden", these books arguably dominated political reading lists for the past year or so ---the less deliberately comic works of self-righteous rightists Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly, Michael Savage and Ann Coulter notwithstanding.)

Regardless of political orientation, this tactic of attacking power with laughter is in the tradition of the court jester and the official Fool that this day more or less celebrates. April Fool's Day harks back to the ancient festivals of spring where all kinds of bad behavior was allowed, including making fun of important people.

The Roman New Year's festival of Kalends (from which we get the word "calendar") featured music, masquerades and all imaginable definitions of fooling around, along with gluttony, drunkenness and gift-giving. A similar festival in ancient Greece was called the "komos," the origin of our word "comedy." We get "comedian" from "komidos," the festival's "chief singer," who was probably a lot like the master of ceremonies telling rude jokes between fan dancers at the burlesque.

Then in the A.D., village spring festivals throughout Europe eventually featured comic performances by a King or a Bishop of Fools, or a Lord of Misrule, often elected from among the common folk to poke fun at the established order for a day.

From ancient Egypt until the last Russian jester hung up his motley in the late l8th century, official Fools were found in royal courts throughout the world. The first court fools weren't kidding: they were authentically deranged, or simple-minded "holy fools" who were both feared and admired as God's chosen innocents. Or they were physically different, or they were considered funny just because they were foreigners. But fools were indulged and well-treated, so "playing the fool" became a prime show business gig.

The resulting "artificial fools" became wildly popular. Pope Leo X was reputed to be so fond of them that petitioners who wished to gain a Papal audience were advised to announce themselves as jesters. The French jester Brusquet was said to have come to the royal court to practice law, but realizing he could make more money in a day as a jester than in a lifetime as a lawyer, he made the modest switch of professions. Will Somers, jester to England's Henry VIII, was a national hero. (It's not clear, however, that Somers actually invented the joke, "Take my wife--please!")

By the 16th century, court jesters were doing just about everything that we now associate with comedy. They told jokes and funny stories (which in French is "geste", and therefore "jest" and "jester"), and performed slapstick in imitation of clumsy country bumpkins (the original meaning of "clown".) Some sang songs and passed on gossip like the troubadours, while others (such as L'Angely, jester to Louis XIV) prefigured the wits and political satirists of European society by whispering penetrating observations and sarcastic remarks in the king's ear.

Fools were hired not only by kings but by lesser officials (one of the annual duties of the Lord Mayor of London's fool was to jump into a tub of custard) as well as clergy and the first corporations. In the homes of the rich it was considered the height of good manners to employ a fool to insult the dinner guests.

Officially, the Fool's function was religious: he (and occasionally, she) was supposed to teach the king or queen humility, even if the royals were more interested in the dirty jokes about the cardinal. But this justification led to the most important legacy of the fool tradition: freedom of speech.

Because official court fools could fulfill their purpose only if they were permitted to speak freely, they had to be protected from punishment from those who were offended, including the king. So for centuries throughout Europe, while others could be beheaded, exiled, excommunicated or burnt at the stake for something they said, there were only two people in all the realm with the absolute right of free speech: the king (or queen), and the jester.

So when the idea of free speech for everyone began to spread, it was envisioned as an extension of the right of fools. In France, young men formed a kind of Free Speech Movement to criticize the government, while wearing traditional jester's clothes. Freedom of expression became so closely linked with the court fool that England's Magna Carta, the first great document challenging absolute royal power in the chain of history leading to the American and French revolutions, was decorated with the figure of the court jester.

American colonists used the jester's brand of free speech to parody and lampoon England's king. Their first revolutionary act was buffoonery: they dressed up, ran around, and dumped tea in the cold water of Boston Harbor.

The British aristocracy made fun of these colonists as backward clowns, which is what they meant by calling them "yankees"(meaning dumb Dutchmen.) But the early Americans relished the fool's image of impudence and transformed Yankee Doodle into a symbol of independence, though he remained a pretty goofy character. (What else can you say about a guy who sticks a feather in his cap and calls it macaroni?) A similar figure, a Yankee "wise fool" stock character popular in early American stage comedies, was a source for Uncle Sam.

American presidents haven't had official jesters (make up your own joke here), but they've often had to endure comedians who got away with saying what other people wouldn't dare. Their humor varied from the relatively gentle chidings of Will Rogers during FDR's presidency, to the excoriating mockery of Mort Sahl and Lenny Bruce in the Eisenhower-McCarthy-Nixon years, to the cultural as well as political explosions of Richard Pryor and Lilly Tomlin, and the parodies of "Saturday Night Live," Canada's "SCTV" and England's "Spitting Image" during the Reagan reign.

These days we have so much mockery-from the nonpartisan laughs on Leno and Letterman to the stinging abuse from both right and left-that we risk a general cynicism towards political leaders and ideas: what playwright Michael Frayn calls the "permanent sneer."

Caustic political humor walks a fine line, easily falling into a universal cynicism and stereotyping, that can set the scornful tone for political reporting and general attitudes. Perhaps that's why some of today's jesters avoid nihilism, though they risk partisanship, by such political activities as Franken's liberal talk radio, or the Rolling Thunder Down Home Democracy Tour of political workshops folded into a roving country fair, organized by political humorist Jim Hightower, with appearances by Michael Moore and Molly Ivins.

Though the Fool remains dangerous, most societies (including various Native American cultures) provide roles for tricksters and "sacred clowns" who mock authority. These societies are willing to risk disorder so that the unspoken becomes part of the balance, that renews their common values. This may be why clowns are sometimes considered to be healers. Renewal through the self-recognition of laughter is also an ancient rite of spring.

As for April Fool's Day itself, the most plausible explanation is that when individual nations began replacing the Julian calendar from Roman times with the new Gregorian calendar, New Year's Day was moved from its usual spring spot to the first of January. (Even today, some indigenous cultures retain the tradition of celebrating the New Year in the spring.) One of the first countries to change was France in the 16th century. But old habits die hard, especially if they began in 45 B.C. When the change was made, pranksters greeted the forgetful with a "Happy New Year" on April 1, and if the mark fell for it, they cried, "April Fool!"

Actually, they cried, "April Fish!" Those wild and crazy French.