Cloud Atlas Quotes

Archivist: The report said Commander Chang was killed in the assault.
Sonmi-451: That is correct.
Archivist: Would you say that you loved him?
Sonmi-451: Yes, I do.
Archivist: Do you mean, you are still, in love with him?
Sonmi-451: I mean, that I will always

be...

[Old Sixsmith notices the "shooting star"-shaped birthmark]
Old Rufus Sixsmith: That's a very peculiar birthmark.
Luisa Rey: Yeah, my mom was sure it was going to be cancerous and kept trying to get me to remove it, but... I kinda like it.
Old Rufus Sixsmith: I knew someone who had a birthmark that was similar to that.

Luisa Rey: Who was it?
Old Rufus Sixsmith: Someone I cared about very much.

Zachry: Who tripped the Fall, if not Old Georgie?
Meronym: True-true? The Old Uns.
Zachry: That's just a rope o'smoke. Old Uns got the Smart. They mastered sick and seeds, they make miracles and fly across the sky.
Meronym: True. All true. But they got somethin' else. A hunger in their hearts, a hunger that's

stronger than all their Smart.
Zachry: Hunger? For what?
Meronym: A hunger for more.

Nurse Noakes: You are going to be sorry in ways you cannot even imagine.
Mr. Meeks: [shrieks to draw attention of the crowd in the pub] Are there no true Scotsmen in the house? Those there English gerrunts are trampling all over my God-given rights!
Nurse Noakes: These people are mine.
[fans growl menacingly]

Mr. Meeks: They've used me and my pals most direly and we are in need of a wee bit of assistance!
Highlander: Right, pal, we'll not let you down
[starts a fight]

Timothy Cavendish: [narrating] While my extensive experience as an editor has led me to a disdain for flashbacks and flash forwards and all such tricksy gimmicks I believe that if you, dear Reader, can extend your patience for just a moment, you will find that there is a Method to this tale of Madness.
Timothy Cavendish: [to himself] Look. I was Dermot

Hoggins' publisher. Not his shrink, not his astrologer. And the ruddy bloody truth is that I had no idea what the man was going to do that night.

Robert Frobisher: [narrating] Dinner of pheasant with Bordeaux rich as buttercream. How I love to listen to men of distinguished lives sing of past follies and glories. The only broken note in the entire evening was Ayrs' wife, Jocasta, excusing herself early. Sensed the buried bone. Later I asked Ayrs about it, he said Kesselring had introduced Jocasta to him. I pried, had

Kesselring been in love with her. The subject was a prickly one.
Vyvyan Ayrs: Jocasta was a Jew. Obviously the relationship was impossible.
Robert Frobisher: Why obviously?
Vyvyan Ayrs: Can you really be so ignorant of what is happening in Germany?
Robert Frobisher: [continues narration] At this point

in my life all I know, Sixsmith, is that this world spins from the same unseen forces that twist our hearts.

[first lines]
Zachry: [shivering beside the fire] Oh, lonesome night. And babbits bawling, the wind biting the bone. Wind like this... full of voices. Ancestry howling at you, yibbering stories, all voices tied up into one. One voice differing. One voice, whispering out there, spying from the dark. The fangy devil, Old Georgie hisself. Mm. Now your ear up close, and I'll

yarn you about the first time we met, eye to eye.

Timothy Cavendish: Never forget Herman Melville, writes a ripping yarn about a big white whale which is summarily dismissed, and yet today it is lugged around in the backpacks of every serious student of literature in the world.
Dermot Hoggins: I don't give a fuck what happens when I'm dead, I want people to buy me book now!
Timothy

Cavendish: Well, as your publisher, obviously nothing would make me happier. But sadly, for whatever reason, 'Knuckle Sandwich' has yet to connect to its audience.
Dermot Hoggins: You want a reason? I'll give you a reason
[points]
Dermot Hoggins: Right there!
Timothy Cavendish: Aaaa, you mean Mr Finch?

Dermot Hoggins: Felix fuckin' Finch! That cunt that shat all over me book in his poncy fuckin' magazine!
Timothy Cavendish: It wasn't that bad.
Dermot Hoggins: No?
[quotes]
Dermot Hoggins: 'Mr Hoggins should apologize to the trees failed for the making of his bloated autobio novel. Four hundred

vain-glorious pages expire in an ending that is flat and inane beyond belief'.
Timothy Cavendish: Steady now, Dermot. What is a critic but one who reads quickly, arrogantly, but never wisely.