The identity of the Stranger is one of the mysteries of D'ni history. Almost nothing is known about the person. We don't know even the Stranger's gender. There are a few references to the Stranger as male, but they are probably a result of English language customs in which the male gender is used when speaking in generalities, rather than actual information.

The Star Fissure's destination — and thus, the location where the Myst Linking Book fell — is in Eddy County, New Mexico. Many explorers have speculated that the Stranger was Spanish, Mexican, or an Amerindian native of the early 19th century. Certainly, it would almost definitely have been someone who would have been in that area at the time.

Some have speculated that the Myst Book could have changed hands after its discovery and before its first use. Some have even speculated that the Stranger could have been Rivenese, as it's known that Gehn had people thrown into the Fissure. Both of those theories are less likely because for the first, the idea that the book would change hands without someone noticing the moving picture of its linking panel is nearly impossible. For the second, the Rivenese didn't speak, read, or write English, and the Stranger did.

Richard A. Watson has stated that Atrus spoke English with his grandmother before his descent into D'ni with Gehn, and his journals were also written in English. Anna's family originated in Europe, which was mentioned in Myst: The Book of Atrus. Since the Stranger is able to read Atrus's journals on Myst Island, we know that he or she was able to speak and read English with some fluency.

Some things that we can guess are:

The Stranger was good at mathematics.

The Stranger was human, as the Riven star fissure leads to Earth, and therefore earth was where Atrus' Myst book eventually landed.

The Stranger was highly intelligent, since he or she solved every puzzle in every Age he or she visited, and also was able to trick Gehn, who was not stupid.

The Stranger apparently was an exceptional photographer, and always took photos of the places he or she visited. According to one account, the Stranger was rumored to have said, "If I couldn't document this place, nobody would believe it."

However it was done, the Stranger discovered Atrus's Myst linking book that had been lost in the Star Fissure, and used it to link to Myst. Exploring it put the Stranger into contact with Atrus, who was trapped in K'veer by his sons Sirrus and Achenar, and on 12 December 1806 Atrus was freed. A month later, the Stranger linked to Riven and rescued Atrus's wife Katran from Gehn. Atrus then made the Stranger fall into the Star Fissure, having deduced that it would return him or her home to Earth.

About ten years later, in 1816, the Stranger met the couple again in Tomahna, which was located about five miles from the Cleft. Atrus had invited the Stranger to visit Releeshahn, a new Age he'd written as a home for the survivors of D'ni. This became a new adventure when a man named Saavedro, who'd been wronged by Atrus's sons, tried to take revenge by stealing the Releeshahn descriptive book. The Stranger not only recovered the book, he or she was also able to send Saavedro home.

Another ten years later, in 1826, the Stranger returned to Tomahna, and in yet another adventure was able to save Atrus' daughter Yeesha from her brother Sirrus, who had kidnapped her in a scheme to trick Atrus into teaching him the Art. It was implied that the Stranger had visited Atrus and his family several times between 1816 and 1826, as he or she was no stranger to Yeesha.

It is not known what became of the Stranger after the events on Serenia, when Yeesha was rescued. Being human, he or she would have died of old age, quite possibly around the time of the American Civil War. The Stranger would most likely have stayed a close friend of Atrus' family up until the end, but did not seem to be involved in Yeesha's journey in 1832, and she did not mention him or her in her notebooks. She lived alone in the Cleft and in D'ni until she met Calam.

The final mention of the Stranger, and one of the only real clues about the Stranger's gender, came in 2005 when Dr. Richard Watson freed the Bahro from their bond to D'ni. Watson encountered Atrus in Releeshahn, and Atrus, old and not in the best of health, seemed to have mistaken him for the Stranger, and referred to him as "old friend".

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