Published in 2004, Cloud Atlas is strange, clever and
original novel. It is made up of six separate but connected narratives,
spanning continents and centuries, from the early 1800s into the distance and
dystopian future.
I’ve been meaning
to read this novel for ages, and finally got round to it a couple of weeks ago.
Having had it recommended to me by several people, and given vague hints as to
what it was about, and having had the structure explained to me several times
before I read it, I came to the novel with certain expectations. The structure
certainly met those exactly. I’ve always been really interested in form (in
both my writing and reading) and love novels with unusual structures. I also
love multiple narrators, because I find voices and what you can do with
different voices one of the most interesting things in literature. We get six narrators/main characters: Adam Erwing, Robert Frobisher, Luisa Rey, Timothy Cavendish, Somni, and Zachary. So as you
can imagine the general set up of Cloud
Atlas very much appeals to me.
The plot isn’t quite
what I thought it would be. In fact, it’s better. Knowing the epic scope of the
novel before I started it, I was expecting the plot to be epic as well. If
you’ve read the book you’ll think this odd as, let’s be honest, it is pretty
epic to write a novel in which the plot spans hundreds and hundreds of years.
However, what I mean is that I was expecting a bigger grand narrative, a more
interconnected plot. Basically, I was expected more world-saving. In my head
for some reason I imagined there would be an actual book, the cloud atlas, that
someone wrote in one century that affected people in the future. I thought the
actions of one narrative would more fully and directly affect the characters in
the next. In actuality, what connects the six narratives is far more subtle: a
birth mark, a few similarities of life, and the happening upon documents or
relics from the past. Apart from these connections, the novel is more like a
collection of documents telling the stories of six individuals, sometimes
extraordinary, sometimes fairly normal, spread across the centuries. It’s
subtle, and it’s brilliant.
The voices are what
I most impresses me. In every narrative Mitchell creates a distinct voice and
characterisation. Admittedly I find the narrators Adam Erwig a little dull and Timothy
Cavendish a little irritating, but every character is different to the next,
and every voice is well-created and sustained. My favourite sections are those
featuring Luisa Rey and Somni, but I’m also fond of Frobisher’s letters,
especially of the way in which you get a sense of the character of the person
they’re addressed to, of the silent reader.
Beyond each
narrative section having its own distinct form and voice, the later ones also
have their own language. This is done
beautifully. You notice slight modifications, slight changes, in the spelling
of some words when it comes to Somni’s narrative. I especially like how brand
names become synonymous with the thing itself. A sony is a computer, for
example. These are small details, but they really bring Mitchell’s future world
to life. In Zachary’s narrative, there are entirely new expressions and words. A
lot of words are spelt differently. However Mitchell does this very skilfully,
because although the language used feels distinctly different to ours now, it
is never alienating. The novel remains easy to read; words that are spelt
differently remain clear, and when new expressions are used we can easily see
where they might have come from in our language today.
Although Zachary
isn’t my favourite character, I am probably most impressed by his section of
the narrative. Here, as in the Somni chapters, Mitchell creates a believable
and fascinating potential future for the human race. He creates this new world
subtly and convincingly, never heavy-handedly, and it feels as real as the more
familiar historical chapters.
What I also really liked
is that each section not only has its own distinct voice and form, but that also
at times each narrative seems to have its own distinct genre. I like that in one book we get a spy thriller, a sci-fic
story, a quest narrative, a glimpse of history, and much much more. It makes for
a fascinating, varied and enjoyable read.
The only criticism
I have of the book is oddly enough also do with the form. As often with novels
based on a brilliant premise (for example, I also found this with Life After Life by Kate Atkinson), I
find the ending a little bit of a let-down. Because of the complex form of the
novel you get several different climaxes, rather than one larger one, and as
the novel ends on one of my least favourite narrators it did seem a slight anti-climax
to me. Further to this, the cyclical nature of the novel means you end where
you began, which I do like, but the length of the book means that by the time
you actually reach the end, you’ve sort of forgotten where you began. What I
mean by this is that when you eventually return to Adam Erwig, your narrative
sympathies have moved elsewhere, and he seems of less interest than the other
characters who you read about more recently. I thus ended up finding the novel’s
closing passages less exciting than the rest of it.
This is, however, a
minor point, and one I can’t think of a plausible way to remedy. Overall I
greatly enjoyed Cloud Atlas. It is
clever, interesting and brilliant novel. It is almost always engaged and it is
unfailingly different. I strongly recommend it.
Greatest
strength: For
me, the distinct voices and structures of the different narrative sections.
Greatest
weakness: Perhaps
the ending.
Let’s
finish on a quote:
Then, as now, dystopia was a function of poverty, not state policy.
What a line.
Next week: The Book of Illusions, but Paul Auster
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