King Lear — Act 2, Scene 3: A wood.

Edgar enters alone after hearing that he has been publicly named as a traitor. He says he barely escaped the search for him by hiding in a tree and now knows he cannot rely on any safe place. To avoid capture, he decides to disguise himself as the most miserable kind of beggar, covering his face with dirt, wrapping himself roughly, and making himself look half-naked and wild. He explains that he has seen poor mad beggars in the countryside who force people to pity them, and he will copy that appearance. He chooses the name “Poor Tom” and says that, as Edgar, he is nothing.

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I heard myself proclaim'd;

And by the happy hollow of a tree

Escaped the hunt. No port is free; no place,

That guard, and most unusual vigilance,

Does not attend my taking. Whiles I may 'scape,

I will preserve myself: and am bethought

To take the basest and most poorest shape

That ever penury, in contempt of man,

Brought near to beast: my face I'll grime with filth;

Blanket my loins: elf all my hair in knots;

And with presented nakedness out-face

The winds and persecutions of the sky.

The country gives me proof and precedent

Of Bedlam beggars, who, with roaring voices,

Strike in their numb'd and mortified bare arms

Pins, wooden pricks, nails, sprigs of rosemary;

And with this horrible object, from low farms,

Poor pelting villages, sheep-cotes, and mills,

Sometime with lunatic bans, sometime with prayers,

Enforce their charity. Poor Turlygod! poor Tom!

That's something yet: Edgar I nothing am.