Marge from Greenfield, Wisconsin, wonders why we refer to someone ostentatiously well-behaved as a goody-two-shoes. The 1765 book, The History of Little Goody Two Shoes tells the story of a poor young girl by the same name whose virtue is at long last handsomely rewarded. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Goody Two-Shoes Origin Story”
Hello, you have A Way with Words.
Hello.
Hi, who’s this?
This is Marge Cushel.
Marge, where are you calling us from?
Greenfield. It’s a suburb of Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Huh. Well, welcome to the show, Marge. What can we do for you?
Well, when my friends talk about their wild adventures when they were young, I always say, I never did those things. I didn’t like breaking the rules. I guess I’m a goody two-shoes. And then we got to wondering the origin of that expression and what it really means. I think it’s a little derogatory in that you sound kind of prissy and all, but I’m not real sure.
Yeah, well, you know, the story of the term goody-two-shoes is really interesting, both from a historical point of view and the fact that there are a couple of linguistic twists at the end of it. The most famous goody two-shoes was the subject of a novel in the late 18th century. It was called The History of Little Goody Two-Shoes. This was a time when there was a real fad for kind of rags-to-riches stories, and stories in particular of young, impoverished women who were really, really well-behaved, and their virtue was eventually rewarded. And that’s what happened in this novel.
Poor Marjorie Meanwell was so impoverished that she only had one shoe, which is really sad, right? But then this clergyman took pity on her and got her another shoe. And she was so happy that she would go up to people and say things like, two shoes, ma’am, two shoes. And eventually she continued to be really good and well-behaved. And she became a teacher and married a rich man. And then she used her newfound wealth to help other people who were similarly impoverished as children and do a lot of good works.
But here’s one of the linguistic twists. The goody in Goody Two-Shoes isn’t really about being good necessarily. Do you remember the Scarlet Letter with Nathaniel Hawthorne?
Yes.
Remember how some of the characters were called goody, like Goody Mortimer?
Oh, I don’t recall that, but sure.
Yeah, there was back in the 16th, 17th century, there was a polite term of address, especially for people of lower social status, which was Goody. And for men, it was Goodman. So I would be Goody Barnette and Grant would be Goodman Barrett. And so the Goody in the case of Goody Two-Shoes was actually like Little Miss Two-Shoes. But there was also, of course, the idea that she was good.
But here’s one other linguistic twist, which is that that’s not even the first appearance of goody-two-shoes in English literature. There was actually a poem back in the 1600s, late 1600s, that sarcastically referred to a woman as goody-two-shoes. But in any case, as you said, it’s kind of a slightly derogatory term, goody-two-shoes. And then some reinforcement later with the appearance of goody-goody, right?
Oh, absolutely.
So the kind of like, oh, don’t be such a goody-goody, kind of reinforce the idea of goody-two-shoes, of having this kind of like, don’t be like that. You’d think you’re too good for everyone.
Exactly.
Yeah, the good kind of has a double function there.
Yeah, so you and I, Marge, were both called goody-two-shoes as kiddos, it sounds like.
Well, even at 81, I don’t like breaking rules. And my parents weren’t real strict, so it just came from me somehow.
I think at 81, you should cut loose a little bit. Just see what happens.
That doesn’t work anymore.
Go five more miles over the speed limit. See what happens.
There you go.
Yeah.
Okay.
All right.
Well, thank you.
Take care now.
Bye-bye.
Bye-bye.
