- The title "Noli Me Tangere" comes from a Latin phrase meaning "touch me not" that Jesus says to Mary Magdalene in the Bible. - Rizal was inspired to write a novel about the Philippines after reading Uncle Tom's Cabin. He proposed the idea to fellow Filipinos in Madrid in 1884 but the project did not materialize. - Rizal wrote the Noli Me Tangere alone between 1884-1886 while traveling through Madrid, Paris, and Germany. He nearly destroyed the manuscript while ill and penniless in Berlin before his friend Maximo Viola funded its publication.