Rumi مولانا جلال‌الدین

13th century · Konya, Anatolia · Spoken by the reed flute

Each became my friend out of his own surmise; none sought out the secrets within me.

هرکسی از ظن خود شد یار من از درون من نجست اسرار من

Masnavi, the opening of book 1

In the same thread

c. 1861 (published 1891) · Massachusetts, USA

I'm nobody! Who are you? Are you nobody, too? Then there 's a pair of us -- don't tell! They 'd banish us, you know.

Poems, Second Series

c. 8th century BC · Ionia, ancient Greece · Odysseus's answer when the one-eyed giant Polyphemus asks his name

Nobody is my name. Nobody is what they call me, my mother and my father and all my companions besides.

Οὖτις ἐμοί γʼ ὄνομα· Οὖτιν δέ με κικλήσκουσι μήτηρ ἠδὲ πατὴρ ἠδʼ ἄλλοι πάντες ἑταῖροι.

Odyssey 9.366–367

1865 · Oxford, England · Said to herself after growing and shrinking

‘Who in the world am I? Ah, that’s the great puzzle!’

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, chapter 2

1860 · United States

Stranger, if you passing meet me and desire to speak to me, why should you not speak to me? And why should I not speak to you?

"To You," in Leaves of Grass