This is a class about ancient philosophy! Just kidding. But the topic we’ll explore together—verbal pranking on April Fools’ Day and what makes a prank successful—intersects in many ways with the art of rhetoric that Aristotle most famously theorized: it involves convincing, influencing into belief or disbelief. We’ll look at several April Fools’ Day pranks and the factors that contribute to their rhetorical success or failure. We’ll look at the motivation of pranksters, the techniques they use, and what these pranks, whether well crafted or less so, can tell us about the art of convincing.