Cloud Atlas Allusions and Cultural References

Literary and Philosophical References

• The Bible (1.4.5) (1.9.1) (1.15.1) (4.1.122) (11.1.41) (11.2.16)
• Homer (1.13.1)
• Matthew Arnold, "Dover Beach" (2.1.9)
• John Keats (2.3.10)
• Edgar Allan Poe, "The Fall of the House of Usher" (2.3.15)
• Friedrich Nietzsche, Also sprach Zarathustra (2.3.17)
• Herman Melville, "Benito Cereno" (2.3.20)
• Shylock from William Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice (2.6.3)
• Oscar Wilde, The Portrait of Dorian Gray (2.6.4)
• Christina Rossetti (2.6.10)
• Lord Byron, Don Juan (2.7.2)
• Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, "The Wreck of the Hesperus" (2.7.17)
• Paul Verlaine, poet (2.7.24)
• Arthur Rimbaud, poet (2.7.25)
• Friedrich Nietzsche (2.8.6)
• H.G. Wells, The Island of Dr. Moreau (2.8.6)
• Norman Mailer (3.14.1)
• Sword of Damocles (3.21.17)
• Wallace Stevens (3.24.5)
• Friedrich Nietzsche, Der Wille zur Macht (3.29.2)
• Robert M. Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance (3.34.1)
• Herman Melville, Moby-Dick (4.1.15)
• Alain-Fournier (4.1.97)
• Charles Dickens (4.1.98)
• Heathcliff from Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights (4.1.62)
• Ghost of Christmas Past from Charles Dickens's A Christmas Carol (4.1.170)
• Ghost of Christmas Future from Charles Dickens's A Christmas Carol (4.1.176)
• Ernest Hemingway, A Moveable Feast (4.1.189)
• Virgil in Dante's Inferno (4.1.193)
• Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (4.1.198) (9.40.3)
• W.W. Jacobs, The Monkey's Paw (4.1.204)
• Sirens, from mythology (4.1.223)
• Jonathan Swift, Gulliver's Travels (4.1.266)
• Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (4.1.271)
• George Orwell (5.1.192)
• Aldous Huxley (5.1.192)
• Plato, Republic (5.1.200)
• Epic of Gilgamesh (5.1.235)
• Jorge Luis Borges, "Funes the Memorious" (5.1.235)
• Ludwig Wittgenstein (5.1.235)
• Beatrix Potter, Peter Rabbit (8.1.2)
• Carl Sagan (8.1.13)
• Primo Levi, Drowned and the Saved (8.1.19)
• Zane Grey (8.1.24)
• Erich Maria Remarque, All Quiet on the Western Front (8.1.24)
• Jan Arkless, No Meat for Me, Please! (8.1.24)
• Sophocles, Oedipus the King (8.1.49)
• William Shakespeare, Titus Andronicus (8.1.219)
• Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (8.1.326)
• Diana (9.42.2)
• Ralph Waldo Emerson, "Brahma" (9.69.1)
• Mark Twain, Huckleberry Finn (10.1.2)
• Gustave Flaubert (10.2.7)
• Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes (10.2.10)
• Charles Dickens, David Copperfield(10.2.10)
• A Thousand and One Nights (10.2.23)
• Sir Walter Scott (10.4.2)
• Mother Goose (10.5.22)
• Axel Munthe (10.5.22)
• Cerberus (10.7.7)
• Rene Descartes (11.2.32)
• Georges Cuvier (11.2.32)
• Herman Melville, Typee (11.2.55)

Classical Music References

• Ralph Vaughn Williams, Sea Symphony (2.1.10)
• Samuel Bradley Noyes, Contrapuntals (2.1.10)
• Erik Satie, Gnossiennes (2.1.12)
• Frederic Chopin, Nocturne in F Major (2.2.4)
• Domenico Scarlatti, 212th in A Major (2.2.4)
• Fred Delius, Air and Dance (2.3.17)
• Richard Wagner, Der Ring des Nibelungen (2.4.2)
• Igor Stravinsky (2.4.2) (10.8.8)
• Jean Sibelius (2.4.2)
• Mily Balakirev (2.4.7)
• Franz Schubert (2.4.7)
• Sir Edward Elgar of Pomp and Circumstance (Elgar appears as a character in Part 2, Chapter 8)
• Henry Purcell (2.8.2)
• Anton Webern (2.8.2)
• Rachmaninoff, Second Piano Concerto (4.1.158)
• Frederick Delius (9.53.4)
• Composer Billy Mayerl (10.4.2)
• Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (10.4.2) (10.5.5)
• Johann Sebastian Bach (10.5.3)
• Felix Mendelssohn (10.5.5)
• Claude Debussy (10.5.23) (10.8.8)
• Ludwig von Beethoven, "Ode to Joy" (10.7.10) (10.7.13)
• Ludwig von Beethoven, Symphony No. Five (10.7.10)
• Robert Schumann (10.7.12)
• Ludwig von Beethoven, Eroica Symphony (10.8.8)
• Alexander Scriabin, White Mass (10.8.8)

Historical References

• California Gold Rush (referenced throughout Parts 1 & 11)
• Captain Harewood (1.5.8)
• Sir Percival (2.1.15)
• Queen Boadicea (2.2.7)
• Nefertiti (2.2.7) (4.1.92)
• Anthony van Dyck, painter (2.2.7)
• Bacchus (2.3.6)
• World War I (2.3.6)
• Sir Thomas Beecham (2.3.10)
• Buchenwald concentration camp (3.5.1)
• Bob Woodward and the Watergate expose (3.21.24)
• "Por qué lloras blanca niña?" (3.22.2)
• J. Edgar Hoover (3.27.1)
• Henry Kissinger (3.29.1)
• Pope Pius XIII (4.1.14) (not a real Pope... yet!)
• Artist Francis Bacon (4.1.60)
• Captain Cook (4.1.97)
• Magellan (4.1.98)
• David Lloyd George (4.1.140) (8.1.14)
• Tutankhamen (4.1.156)
• George H.W. Bush (4.1.181)
• Nancy Reagan (4.1.181)
• Historian Edward Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (4.1.182) (5.1.235)
• Hans Holbein (4.1.193)
• Florence Nightingale (4.1.215)
• Kim Jong-Il (5.1.192)
• Mark Rothko (5.1.232)
• Siddhartha Gautama (7.1.147-7.1.150)
• Painter El Greco (8.1.255)
• The Yalta Conference (8.1.325)
• Frank Lloyd Wright (9.48.1)
• Nebuchadnezzar (9.48.6)
• Ronald Reagan (9.52.15)
• Gerald Ford (9.56.8)
• Henry Kissinger (9.58.8)
• Jackson Pollock (9.66.1)
• Willem de Kooning (9.66.1)
• Joan Miró (9.66.1)
• Andy Warhol (9.66.1)
• The Last Supper (10.2.10)
• Francis Kilver (10.2.11)
• Hernan Cortes (10.8.10)
• Tenochtitlan (10.8.10)
• Captain Cook & the HMS Endeavor (11.1.2)

Pop Culture References

• Joni Mitchell (3.2.10)
• Shere Khan from The Jungle Book movie (3.3.5)
• Alfred Hitchcock and various movies (3.5.1) (9.66.12)
• Audrey Hepburn in Charade (3.5.2) (9.66.12)
• The Incredible Hulk (3.8.1)
• Jaws (3.8.2)
• I Love Lucy (3.8.17)
• Richard Pryor (3.14.1)
• Bewitched (3.16.3)
• John Denver, "Leaving on a Jet Plane" (3.18.1)
• Snow White (3.19.1) (9.57.1) (9.70.1)
• Starsky and Hutch (3.24.9)
• Bob Dylan, Blood on the Tracks (3.24.12)
• Bambi (3.31.1)
• Jerry Garcia and the Grateful Dead (3.31.12)
• Barbie (4.1.2)
• "The Girl from Ipanema" (4.1.5)
• David Bowie, "Space Oddity" (4.1.13)
• Mary Poppins (4.1.18)
• Humphrey Bogart (4.1.57)
• Dirty Harry (4.1.80)
• Nina Simone (4.1.140)
• Sid Rotten, an old man's mix-up of Sid Vicious and Johnny Rotten of the Sex Pistols (4.1.151)
• Spider-Man's arch-nemesis, The Green Goblin (4.1.175)
• Soylent Green (4.1.271)
• One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, the movie (4.1.292)
• E.T. (4.1.306)
• Cinderella (5.1.201)
• Marilyn Monroe (7.1.172)
• True Grit (8.1.14)
• John Wayne (8.1.14)
• The Creature from the Black Lagoon (8.1.17)
• Kylie Minogue (8.1.140)
• Mrs. Robinson from The Graduate (8.1.140)
• Casablanca (8.1.143)
• Narnia (8.1.156)
• Musician John Cage (8.1.156)
• Chet Baker, "Let's Get Lost" (8.1.255)
• Close Encounters of the Third Kind (8.1.255)
• The Six Million Dollar Man (9.47.9)
• Wonder Woman (9.55.1)
• Harry Nilsson, "Everybody's Talkin'" (9.55.1)
• Big Bird (9.64.4)
• Donald Duck (9.64.11)
• Scooby-Doo (9.64.11)
• "Greensleeves" (10.2.10)