Suck Eggs

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Good morning. How are you?

Great. Who’s this?

This is Mary from Palm Beach Gardens, Florida.

Mary, welcome to the show.

Hi, Mary.

Well, I have a saying that I’ve never heard anybody say it, but I’ve read it a lot.

And I wondered if you could tell me what it means and where it came from.

We will try. Let’s hear it.

Okay. Don’t try to teach your grandmother how to suck eggs.

And where have you read this?

I don’t really know. I read so much. I read about 10 books a week.

Wow.

Over the years, I’ve read it a couple times enough that it was peculiar enough that it stuck with me.

Yeah, very peculiar.

And Mary, what context do you read this in? I mean, what does it mean?

It sounds like it means been there, done that, don’t try to tell me how to do my job.

Yeah, more like the latter.

Yeah, but I don’t know how the grandmother sucking eggs come into it.

That’s the question.

Are you a grandmother yourself?

I am, and I have never sucked an egg in my life.

All right.

You didn’t have to be taught then.

Yeah.

Nobody’s teaching you anything.

I don’t know why anybody would anyhow.

I was going to say, if you did.

Big question with this saying, isn’t it, Martha?

Why is the grandmother in this saying sucking eggs?

Yeah, it’s crazy.

I mean, I try to think of my own grandmothers,

And I can only imagine one of them sucking eggs, not the other one.

So how is this imagination going?

What is happening?

I mean, when is she doing this?

It’s probably an older person talking to a younger person who knows it all.

Very good.

Exactly.

And he’s going to show her how to boil water or something, you know?

Exactly, exactly.

Getting very exasperated.

That’s exactly it.

It’s part of a long tradition of warning younger people not to presume that they know more than their elders

Or that somebody who’s not professional knows more than a professional.

And I think it lasted because it’s just such a crazy, funny image.

I mean, there are other variations of this.

Don’t teach your grandmother to milk ducks or don’t teach your grandmother to steal sheep.

Oh, my.

Yeah, but those didn’t survive, and this one did, or at least not very much.

And the story as I saw it was that apparently there used to be a time when people would go into other folks’ hen houses

And literally poke a hole in both ends of the eggs and suck the yolk and the whites right through the eggshell

And then put it back in the nest.

Oh, sneaky.

And you can actually do the opposite.

You can blow the contents of an egg out through the holes and then make Christmas ornaments, and I’ve done that.

Oh, you’ve done that?

I’ve blown an egg.

I haven’t sucked an egg.

And I know that sounds terrible, but it’s completely above board.

I’m just picturing these roving bands of grandmothers breaking into hen houses and sucking the eggs.

Well, I think about a time when the average economy was a lot lower and average income was a lot lower

And people were living a little closer to the earth, right?

More agricultural, less income, spare cash was minimal, right?

Could it have been an old thing?

Oh, I think it’s very, very old.

Yeah, it’s at least 300 years old.

Oh, good boy.

It first shows up in English in the early 1700s from a translation of a Spanish work.

So apparently this expression was used in Spanish before it was used in English.

Oh, my.

Yeah.

That’s interesting.

Yeah, so a long history there.

Mary, thank you so much for calling us and telling us that grandmothers don’t always suck eggs.

Not usually.

Not usually.

Thank you very much.

It’s been enjoyable talking with you.

Our pleasure.

Always glad to hear from a fellow reader.

Okay.

Take care now.

Thanks, Mary.

Bye.

Bye-bye.

Ten books a week!

My gosh!

I envy her.

I wish I had the time.

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