Quotes about loneliness

26 real sentences about loneliness, left by people who came before us, from 7th century BC to 1926, oldest first. Each one has its source and the original text.

Adad-shum-usur Adadi-shum-uṣur

7th century BC · Nineveh, Assyria · After praising the good days of the new king, asking a post for his son Ardi-Gula

The hungry are satisfied. The lean grow fat. The plantations are covered with fruits. Only I and Ardi-Gula among them have our soul depressed, our heart disturbed.

A letter to the king · in place of the original: the English translation by C. H. W. Johns (1904)

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Confucius 孔子

5th century BC · Lu, Spring and Autumn China

"No one knows me!" Zigong asked: "Why do you say that no one knows you?" "I do not resent heaven and I do not blame people. I study what is below and reach what is above. The one that knows me is heaven, perhaps."

子曰：「莫我知也夫！」子貢曰：「何爲其莫知子也？」子曰：「不怨天，不尤人，下學而上達。知我者其天乎！」

Analects, book 14 (Xianwen)

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Ovid Publius Ovidius Naso

c. AD 12 · Roman Empire · From Tomis, his place of exile

Here it is I who am the barbarian, understood by no one, and the dull Getae laugh at Latin words.

Barbarus hic ego sum, qui non intellegor ulli, et rident stolidi uerba Latina Getae

Tristia (Sorrows) 5.10

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Chen Ziang 陳子昂

696 · Tang China

Before me I do not see the ancients. Behind me I do not see those to come. I think of heaven and earth, so vast, so long, and alone, in grief, my tears fall.

前不見古人，後不見來者。念天地之悠悠，獨愴然而涕下。

"Song on Climbing the Terrace of Youzhou," in the Complete Tang Poems

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Wang Wei 王維

mid-8th century · Tang China

I sit alone in the secluded bamboo grove, play my zither, then whistle long. Deep in the woods no one knows I am here; the bright moon comes and shines on me.

獨坐幽篁裏，彈琴復長嘯。深林人不知，明月來相照。

"Bamboo Grove Lodge," in the Complete Tang Poems

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Hanshan 寒山

c. 8th–9th century · Mount Tiantai, Tang China

People ask the way to Cold Mountain. No road goes through to Cold Mountain. In summer the ice has not melted, and when the sun comes out the fog is thick.

人問寒山道，寒山路不通。夏天冰未釋，日出霧朦朧。

Poems of Hanshan

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Liu Zongyuan 柳宗元

c. 810 · Tang China · In exile at Yongzhou

On a thousand hills no bird flies. On ten thousand paths no footprint is left. A lone boat, an old man in straw cape and hat, fishing alone in the cold river snow.

千山鳥飛絕，萬逕人蹤滅。孤舟蓑笠翁，獨釣寒江雪。

"River Snow," in the Complete Tang Poems

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Choe Chiwon 崔致遠

late 9th century · Silla Korea

In the autumn wind I can only chant in pain. In all the world, few know my music. Outside the window, rain at the third watch. Before the lamp, a heart ten thousand ages away.

秋風惟苦吟擧世少知音囱外三更雨燈前萬古心

Goun jip, book 1, "On an Autumn Night, in the Rain"

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Abu Firas أبو فراس الحمداني

960s · Aleppo, Syria · In prison in Constantinople

I said, as a dove moaned close beside me: Neighbour, do you feel what I am going through? God forbid! You have never tasted the blow of parting, and no cares have ever crossed your mind.

أقول وقد ناحت بقربي حمامة : أيا جارتا هل تشعرين بحالي ؟ معاذ الهوى ! ماذقت طارقة النوى ، ولا خطرت منك الهموم ببال

Divan of Abu Firas, the poems of captivity (Rumiyyat)

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Li Qingzhao 李清照

1130s · Song China · In her last years, alone, having lost her husband and her home

Seeking, seeking, searching, searching, cold, cold, bleak, bleak, mournful, wretched, sorrowful. This time of sudden warmth and cold again is the hardest in which to rest.

尋尋覓覓，冷冷清清，淒淒慘慘戚戚。乍暖還寒時候，最難將息。

To the tune "Slow, Slow Song"

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Saigyo 西行

12th century · late Heian Japan

If only there were one more who has learned to bear loneliness: we would build our huts side by side, in this mountain village in winter.

さびしさに堪へたる人のまたもあれな庵ならべむ冬の山里

Shin kokin wakashu, poems of winter

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Yi Gyubo 李奎報

13th century · Goryeo Korea

The people of the world have all forgotten me. Within the four seas, this one body is alone. And not only the world: my brothers have forgotten me too. Today my wife forgets me, tomorrow I shall forget myself. After that, between heaven and earth, there will be neither near nor far at all.

世人皆忘我四海一身孤豈唯世忘我兄弟亦忘予今日婦忘我明日吾忘吾却後天地內了無親與踈

Dongguk Yi Sangguk jip, "On Forgetting"

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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

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The singer of "Cheongsan byeolgok"

c. 13th–14th century · Goryeo Korea

Cry, cry, bird; wake from sleep and cry, bird. I, with more sorrows than you, wake from sleep and cry too.

우러라 우러라 새여 자고 니러 우러라 새여. 널라와 시름 한 나도 자고 니러 우니로라.

"Cheongsan byeolgok" (Song of the Green Hills), second stanza, in Akjang gasa

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William Shakespeare

published 1609 · England

When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes I all alone beweep my outcast state, And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries, And look upon myself, and curse my fate

Sonnets, 29

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Nameless singers 蔓橫淸類無名氏

before 1728 · Joseon Korea

Cricket, that cricket, poor little cricket. What sort of cricket is it that, as the moon sets and the night wears on, with long notes and short notes, every note a sorrow, cries on and on all by itself, and so cruelly wakes my light sleep behind the silk window? Let it be. Small creature that it is, in this empty room it may be the only one who knows my heart.

귓도리 져 귓도리 에엿부다 져 귓도리 어인 귓도리 지ᄂᆞᆫ ᄃᆞᆯ 새ᄂᆞᆫ 밤의 긴 소릐 쟈른 소릐 節節이 슬픈 소릐 제 혼자 우러 녜어 紗窓 여왼ᄌᆞᆷ을 ᄉᆞᆯ드리도 ᄭᆡ오ᄂᆞᆫ고야 두어라 제 비록 微物이나 無人洞房에 내 ᄠᅳᆺ 알 리ᄂᆞᆫ 저ᄲᅮᆫ인가 ᄒᆞ노라

A long sijo (saseol sijo), in Cheonggu yeongeon (1728)

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Ludwig van Beethoven

October 6, 1802 · Bonn · Vienna · While he was hiding the fact that he was going deaf

Oh! ye who think or declare me to be hostile, morose, and misanthropical, how unjust you are, and how little you know the secret cause of what appears thus to you!

The "Heiligenstadt Testament," written to his two brothers · in place of the original: the English translation by Lady Wallace (1866)

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Leo Tolstoy Лев Толстой

July 7, 1854 · Russian Empire · At twenty-five, serving in the army

I am ugly, awkward, untidy and socially uneducated. I am irritable, boring to others, immodest, intolerant and bashful as a child. I am almost an ignoramus.

Я дурен собой, неловок, нечистоплотен и светски необразован. — Я раздражителен, скучен для других, нескромен, нетерпим (intolérant) и стыдлив, как ребенок. — Я почти невежда.

Diary, in the Complete Works of Tolstoy, vol. 47

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Charles Baudelaire

1859 · Paris, France · Of a great seabird that sailors catch for fun and set down on the deck

The Poet is like that prince of the clouds who haunts the storm and laughs at the archer; exiled on the ground, amid the jeering, his giant's wings keep him from walking.

Le Poète est semblable au prince des nuées Qui hante la tempête et se rit de l'archer; Exilé sur le sol au milieu des huées, Ses ailes de géant l'empêchent de marcher.

"The Albatross," in The Flowers of Evil

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Jose Hernandez José Hernández

1872 · Buenos Aires, Argentina

Here I settle down to sing to the beat of my guitar, for a man kept from his sleep by an uncommon sorrow, like the solitary bird, finds comfort in his song.