Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell
"Cloud Atlas" by David Mitchell is a novel that intricately weaves together six distinct stories spanning different time periods and genres, exploring themes of interconnectedness, reincarnation, and the impact of individual actions across time. The narrative begins in the 19th century with Adam Ewing, a young attorney who becomes embroiled in the moral complexities of slavery while stranded in the South Pacific. The timeline then shifts to 1931, where Robert Frobisher, a composer, grapples with personal and artistic struggles as he seeks recognition and grapples with relationships.
The subsequent stories include Luisa Rey, a journalist uncovering corporate corruption in the 1970s, and Timothy Cavendish, an elderly publisher who finds himself in a nursing home against his will. The narrative then leaps into a dystopian future where Sonmi~451, a genetically engineered clone, seeks freedom and rights for her kind, followed by a post-apocalyptic tale featuring Zachry, a member of a primitive tribe navigating survival in a devastated world.
Each story is interconnected, echoing themes of oppression, love, and the quest for identity, with characters' actions reverberating through time, highlighting how history shapes humanity's future. "Cloud Atlas" invites readers to reflect on the profound connections that bind us, transcending the barriers of time, culture, and circumstance.
On this Page
Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell
- Born: January 1, 1969
- Birthplace: Southport, Lancashire, England
First published: 2004
Type of work: Novel
Type of plot: Science Fiction
Time of plot: From the nineteenth century to the distant future
Locales: Belgium; United Kingdom; Hawaii; Raiatea, French Polynesia
Principal Characters
Adam Ewing, a young attorney
Robert Frobisher, a composer
Luisa Rey, a journalist
Timothy Cavendish, a book publisher
Sonmi~451, a clone
Zachry, a member of a primitive tribe
The Story
In Cloud Atlas, author David Mitchell intertwines six stories. The first begins in the nineteenth century: stuck on the Chatham Islands in the South Pacific Ocean while his ship is being repaired, young attorney Adam Ewing meets and befriends Dr. Henry Goose, a friendly, eccentric man. While wandering the island one day, they encounter a slave being beaten. Back on the ship, Goose tends to an ailment afflicting Ewing. One night, Ewing awakens in his cabin to find Autua, the slave whom they had seen on shore. Ewing allows Autua to stay aboard if he can prove his worth as a sailor.
Goose continues treating Ewing’s ailment with medicinal powders. Gradually, Ewing realizes that Goose has been poisoning him in order to rob him. Goose disappears from the ship, and Autua saves Ewing’s life by forcing him to drink rainwater to dilute the poison. His experiences lead Ewing to devote his life to the abolitionist movement.
The narrative moves forward chronologically to 1931, where music student Robert Frobisher travels to Belgium in hopes of becoming the musical aide to aging composer Vyvyan Ayrs. The old composer reluctantly hires him, and Frobisher acquaints himself with the composer’s wife, Jocasta. In Ayrs’s library, Frobisher finds an incomplete journal of Ewing. Via letters, Frobisher asks his former lover Rufus Sixsmith to find a complete copy of the journal.
Jocasta begins flirting with Frobisher, and as his music collaboration with Ayrs continues, he begins an affair with her. She becomes more demanding, which frustrates Frobisher. As Ayrs becomes ill, Frobisher concentrates on his own composition, the Cloud Atlas Sextet.
Tensions rise in the house, and Ayrs demands that Frobisher compose work he can pass off as his own. Frobisher refuses and leaves the house, but not before Ayrs reveals that he has known all along of Frobisher’s affair with Jocasta. Frobisher moves to an inn, where he finishes the Cloud Atlas Sextet before committing suicide.
Decades later, Frobisher’s lover Sixsmith has become a physicist in the employ of the Seaboard Corporation, which is set to unveil its HYDRA nuclear facility. Sixsmith possesses a report indicting Seaboard of corruption. In an elevator, he meets Luisa Rey, a magazine reporter. Influenced by her meeting with Sixsmith, she begins researching an exposé on Seaboard.
Knowing Sixsmith has the evidence to expose its corruption, Seaboard sends its assassin, Bill Smoke, to kill him. Before Smoke shoots Sixsmith, he hides several of Frobisher’s letters in a hotel room’s Bible. Pretending to be Sixsmith’s niece, Rey visits the murder scene. She is given the Frobisher letters and becomes intrigued by the Cloud Atlas Sextet. A record dealer helps her procure a recording of the composition, which she believes she has heard before.
Joe Napier, a Seaboard employee, helps Rey, hiding a copy of Sixsmith’s HYDRA report in her car. As Rey drives away from the facility, Smoke runs her off a bridge. She survives the crash and eludes another assassination attempt with the help of Napier. Through Sixsmith’s real niece, she obtains another copy of Sixsmith’s report. Smoke and Napier kill each other, and Rey successfully exposes the corrupt actions of Seaboard’s executives.
The story then follows Timothy Cavendish, an elderly man who owns an unsuccessful vanity press. When one of Cavendish’s clients murders a critic, the company’s sales increase. The relatives of the murdered author seek royalties from Cavendish. Cavendish is unable to pay them, so his brother arranges for him to hide at the Aurora House. On his train ride, Cavendish begins reading a manuscript entitled Half-Lives: The First Luisa Rey Mystery.
Unbeknownst to Cavendish, the Aurora House is a no-leave nursing home. Determined to escape, he suffers a stroke. When he recovers, he conspires with a small group of residents to break out. They escape, and Cavendish moves to Edinburgh, Scotland, where he prepares to publish the book about Luisa Rey.
Cloud Atlas then leaps into the distant future, where clones work as slaves. One clone, Sonmi~451, begins to "ascend" by forming independent thoughts. One morning, she is escorted from her quarters to a university, where she is to be examined.
Sonmi~451 expands her knowledge independently. She befriends Hae-Joo Im, a member of a revolutionary group attempting to overthrow the corporate structure. When authorities come looking for Im, Sonmi~451 goes into hiding with him.
After witnessing the horrors perpetuated by the authorities on clones, Sonmi~451 decides to draft a bill of rights. Im manages to smuggle Sonmi~451’s draft to safety before she is arrested and sentenced to death. Her final request is to watch the film The Ghastly Ordeal of Timothy Cavendish.
The final story is set further into the future, after a nuclear holocaust has devastated the planet. Those alive form primitive tribes to survive. Zachry is a member of the Valleymen tribe that worships the benevolent god Sonmi and fears the rival Konas.
The Prescients, an advanced tribe, sends Meronym to live among the Valleymen. She stays with Zachry, who warms to her only after she helps cure his sister of an illness. During a mountain excursion, Meronym explains to Zachry that Sonmi was a martyr, not a god. After a Kona attack, Zachry’s family is killed. He reluctantly escapes the island with Meronym. Together they raise a family in Maui.
Bibliography
Boze, Teresa. "David Mitchell." Guide to Literary Masters and Their Works (2007): 1. Literary Reference Center Plus. Web. 21 Apr. 2014.
Dillon, Sarah, ed. David Mitchell: Critical Essays. Canterbury: Glyphi, 2011. Print.
Puffer-Rothenberg, Maureen J. "Cloud Atlas." Magill’s Literary Annual 2005 (2005): 1–3. Literary Reference Center Plus. Web. 21 Apr. 2014. Wood, James. "The Floating Library: What Can’t Novelist David Mitchell Do?" New Yorker. Condé Nast, 5 July 2010. Web. 27 Mar. 2014.