英语论文：A Human “History” of Challenging the Established

Cloud Atlas ---A Human “History” of Challenging the Established System
摘 要
   近年来，西方文学界对《云图》的研究日趋兴盛，从互文性、叙事策略、乌托邦思想、轮回观、后人类现象等角度出发的小说评论己不鲜见。然而，在国内，对米切尔及其作品的研究还有待进一步发展，因为以往的成果多是关于米切尔本人或其小说的介绍性文章，系统深刻的学术性评论尚不多见。本文试结合福柯的身体思想探讨小说中权力机制对身体的刻写与规训以及主人公的反抗和自我塑造。
文章分为了四部分来阐述，第一章为引言部分，介绍了本文的研究背景，为下文的而研究做铺垫；第二章写关于本文的国内外研究现状，为下文的研究做铺垫；第三章重点论述层级监视、规范化裁决和检查等规训策略在小说中的奥罗拉公寓和内索国是如何实施来规范人们的行为并维持其统治秩序的；第四章主要探讨黑奴奥拓华、克隆人星美-451 和女记者路易莎是如何对外部世界强加秩序进行反抗并对自我的身体进行塑造的。带着一种永不言弃的精神，奥拓华不断尝试逃跑。尽管多次被抓回，但他从未放弃对自由的渴望与追寻。本文的研究，一起为研究《图云》这方面的学者及参考值做借鉴。
关键词：《云图》;人类;权力;反抗

Abstract
With an increasing amount of academic studies on Cloud Atlas in western literary circle, some researches from the perspectives of intertextuality, narrative strategy, Utopia, transmigration, posthuman have been published. However, academic studies on Mitchell and his works at home are rather fragmentary. Generally speaking, most of the previous studies are just introductory reviews and there are very few critical writings focusing on systematic and profound analysis. This thesis, based on Foucault s body thoughts, attempts to interpret the description and discipline of power mechanism towards body and the resistance and self-shaping of the individuals. According to Foucault, body is primarily written by discourse power, as a result, the abnormal and madness come into being. Then, the whole society like a panopticon controls and disciplines the bodies, which will become more and more docile and useful in the process. Nevertheless, where there is power, there is resistance. Body is not only the passive power object, but also the resistant with the ability to subvert and self shape.
KeyWord: Cloud Atlas; human; power; resistance


Contents
1. Introduction 4
2. Literature Review 5
3. Body Controlled by Disciplinary Power in Cloud Atlas 7
3.1 Body and Disciplinary Power 7
3.1.1 Hierarchical Observation 8
3.1.2 Normalizing judgment 8
3.1.3 The Examination 9
3.2 The Docile Bodies in Cloud Atlas 11
3.2.1 The Aged in Aurora House 11
3.2.2 The Clones in Nea So Copros 13
3.3 Summary 16
4. Body Governed by Oneself in CloudAtlas 17
4.1 Resistance and Self-shaping of Body 17
4.2 The Self-shaped Bodies in Cloud Atlas 19
4.2.1 Autua 19
4.2.2 Sonmi~451 22
4.2.3 Luisa 24
4.3 Summary 27
5. Conclusion 28
6. Bibliography 29


1. Introduction
The novel Cloud Atlas, short-listed for Booker Prize, consists of six interlinked stories (written in different styles) that take readers from the remote South Pacific in the nineteenth century to a distant, post apocalyptic future. The first story begins in the Chatham Islands (a remote Pacific Ocean archipelago) in the 1850s. Adam Ewing, a guileless American notary from San Francisco poisoned by the doctor Henry Goose records his adventures and thoughts aboard the Prophetess by a travel journal. The next story is set in Zedelghem, Belgium, 1931.
It is told in the form of letters from Robert Frobisher, a recently disowned and penniless, bisexual young English musician, to his old friend and lover, Rufus Six-smith, back in Cambridge. The third story, set in the fictional city of Buenas Yerbas, California, in 1975, is written in the style of a mystery/thriller novel. Luisa Rey, a young journalist, investigates the report that proves a new nuclear power plant is unsafe. The fourth story is comic in tone, and set in Britain in the present day. Timothy Cavendish, a 65-year old press publisher, flees the brothers of his gangster client and gets trapped in a far-off hotel, which in fact turns out to be a nursing home in which Timothy is damnably treated. The fifth story is set in Nea So Copros, a dystopia futuristic state that is gradually revealed to be in Korea and to be a totalitarian state that has evolved from corporate culture. It is told in the form of an interview between the genetically engineered fabricant Sonmi-451 and an“archivist" who is recording her story. In the sixth story, Zachry, an old man, tells a story from his youth. As peace- loving farmers, his people, the valley folk who are often raided by the violent Kona tribe worship a goddess called Sonmi and know“The Fall", in which the civilized peoples of Earth (called Old Uns in Cloud Atlas) collapse and the survived people have been reduced to primitivism. These stories are seemingly unrelated but actually intersecting, which makes Cloud Atlas honored the most challenging novel to the imagination of readers.


2. Literature Review
As a distinguished writer and the only British novelist under fifty years old whose works have had an academic conference dedicated to them,Mitchell has attracted numerous scholars' attention abroad and at home. The researches abroad on Mitchell himself and his works are comparatively comprehensive, but in China, only a few relevant academic achievements have been reported up till now in addition to the appearance of Chinese . versions corresponding to those five novels Mitchell has published and a small amount of introductory articles.
Mitchell and his works are widely studied by many scholars abroad. Some academic dissertations such as“Postmodernist Intertextuality in David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas" (2008) by Martina Hrubes from Goethe Universal Frankfurt and“David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas:‘Revolutionary or Gimmicky?"" (2010) by Sarah Jane Johnston Ellis from Massey University have been submitted. The former applies the concept of“postmodernist intertextuality” to analyze the effects of these different kinds of intertextuality and in how far they correspond to postmodernist notions of textuality and history. The latter examines Mitchell's use of postmodern narrative structures and strategies in Cloud Atlas and how these relate to his overtly political concerns regarding relations of power between individuals and between factions.
There are also some articles about Cloud Atlas appearing in various periodicals. Heather J. Hicks'“This Time Round': David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas and the Apocalyptic Problem of Historicism" by combining with Micea Eliade 's we l-known philosophical treatise The Myth of the Etrnal Return (1955) argues that Mitchell's preoccupation with cyclical temporarily can be understood as a reaction against what Eliade calls “the terror of history". Heather 's research indicates that Mitchell takes the contemporary climate of global crisis as an occasion to weigh didactically the affective, social and political resources that historic and cyclical forms of subjectivity and ontology may provide in the service of deterring our collective annihilation.
Sandrine Sorlin's“A Linguistic Approach to David Mitchell's Science Fiction Stories in Cloud Atlas" claims the style Mitchell in Cloud Atlas shows is not specific to an author but to a particular narrative. In other words, the novel seems to illustrate a truism: the same language can create different worlds by deploying stylistic devices adequate to the overall design, however, Mitchell remolds standard English to fit the world he has in mind and the subject matter is carved into existence through a carefully sharpened language. 
This collection of critical essays focuses on his first three novels and provides a sustained analysis of Mitchell s complex narrative techniques and the literary, political and cultural implications of his early work. Such theses as“The Stories We Tell: Discursive Identity Through Narrative Form in Cloud Atlas”by Courtney Hopf,“Cloud Atlas: From Postmodernity to the Posthuman”by Helene Machinal,“Cloud Atlas and
If on a Winter s Night a Traveler: Fragmentation and Integrity in the Postmodern Novel" by Will McMorran,“Str ange Transactions: Utopia, Transmigration and Time in Ghostwriten and Cloud Atlas”by Caroline Edwards, “Speculative Fiction as Postcolonial: Critique in Ghostivritten and Cloud Atlas" by Nicholas Dunlop cover the topics ranging from narrative structure，genre and the Bilingualism to representations of Japan, postmodernism, the construction of identity, utopia, science fiction and post-colonialism.
Different from abundant studies on Mitchell abroad, the research of Cloud Atlas in China is just at its very beginning. At home, Shanghai Literature and Art Press has published the Chinese versions corresponding to those five novels Mitchell has finished, increasing the popularity of Mitchell and his works among Chinese readers.
During the week-long 2012 Shanghai Book Fair, Mitchell appeared with his works an had a talk with Chinese writer Su Tong on the topic of“How to build a house of fiction?”.According to Mitchell, writer is to novel what architect is to building, with the aim to tempting readers to step into the building, consider what material is this building made of, an finally understand the world a writer tries his best to fictionalize. That is to say, the story is truly fictional, but the zeal of readers to follow the plots depends on the author 's writing skills.
However, only a few relevant academic researches related to Cloud Atlas have been reported in China. From the reference to the information available, some studies are from the perspective of cinematographic adaptation. Being the introductory articles about the adaption of Cloud Atlas by the same name, Pei Xiaolei's “Cloud Atlas: Fragments of Narrative and Duration of Spirit" and“Cloud Atlas: The R evolutionary Narrative of Baronial Proposition” edited and translated by Jing Yu give the audience and readers more specific information about the content of this novel. Zhang Tao's “Let the Soul Fly - About the Adaption of Cloud Atlas" carries out a juxtaposition of film and novel, re-examines the picturizing process of Cloud Atlas, and narrates the techniques and effects of adaption from the aspects of microscopical structure, microscopical narration and the matric development.
In addition, Chen Peiyong's“The Sextet of Cloud Atlas and Human Destiny”pays more attention to the philosophical meaning of Cloud Atlas and explores six philosophical propositions including Truth, Life, Order, Revolution, Civilization and Eternity. It comes to a conclusion that the individual's life is always connected to the common destiny of human beings, which could promote endless thinking of readers.
According to the above literature review of the studies on Mitchell and Cloud Atlas, it can be summarized that most studies at home are just introductory reviews and there are very few critical writings focusing on systematic and profound analysis. That is to say, there is much room for a variety of interpretations of Mitchell whom the readers still know so little and of his works which influence the literary circle so much. This thesis attempts to explore the interaction of body and power in Cloud Atlas under Foucault's body thoughts, which focuses on the exclusion effect of discourse power, the control of disciplinary power towards body, characters' resistance to power and self- shaping.


3. Body Controlled by Disciplinary Power in Cloud Atlas
As mentioned earlier, on one hand, body is defined and excluded by discourse power; on the other hand, it cannot avoid the control and manipulation of disciplinary power. In a sense, discourse power selects objects to normalize, while disciplinary power covers ways of regulating. In Discipline and Punish: the Birth of the Prison, Foucault points out that the human body is trained and shaped to be docile and useful. One has to be disciplined into “docile bodies” keeping in conformity with the norms and disciplines through every restriction and requirement. In Cloud Atlas, disciplinary power forces the aged in Aurora House and the clones in Nea So Copros to be obedient bodies who like walking corpses have no independent behaviour or thought. Through the analysis of a series of disciplinary techniques in the novel, it could be proved that both Aurora House and Nea So Copros are Foucauldian panoptic society where disciplinary power disperses throughout the whole social body. 
3.1 Body and Disciplinary Power 
In the point of view of Foucault, the key to perceive power lies not in what power is or who possesses power but in how power is exercised. That is to say, power should be understood in terms of its disciplining mechanism and the techniques. Discipline is a specific power technique which controls the operation of bodies by training and coercing. Instead of being identified with an institution or an apparatus, discipline comprises “a whole set of instruments, techniques, procedures, levels of application, targets; it is a ‘physics’ or an ‘anatomy’ of power, a technology” (Foucault, 1977:215). It is “an art of the human body” (ibid. 137) which is “reduced as a ‘political’ force at the least cost and maximized as a useful force” (ibid. 221). Disciplinary power views body as both the object and instrument of its control, thus renders itself a calculated and permanent operating mechanism through distribution and classification. 
With the techniques of hierarchical observation, normalizing judgment, the examination, etc., disciplinary power produces docile bodies that follow certain norms. Without them, the effective operation of disciplinary power is hard to realize. 
3.1.1 Hierarchical Observation 
Hierarchical observation is based on the fact that people’s behaviour can be controlled simply by observing them. According to Foucault, the “exercise of discipline presupposes a mechanism that coerces by means of observation; an apparatus in which the techniques that make it possible to see induce effects of power, and in which, conversely, the means of coercion make those on whom they are applied clearly visible” (Foucault, 1977:170-171). The operation of disciplinary power have to resort to observation. 
Similar structure of continuous observation is found in hospitals, asylums, schools, prisons, factories, etc., as it functions to “render visible those who are inside it, … to transform individuals: to act on those it shelters, to provide a hold on their conduct, to carry the effect of power right to them, to make it possible to know them, to alter them” (ibid. 172). In a perfect disciplinary mechanism, it is possible for “a single gaze to see everything constantly” (ibid. 173) and nothing could escape from the observation. 
Hierarchical observation penetrates into people’s daily life. For instance, in factories, specific personnel, such as clerks, supervisors and foremen are employed to inspect the labor process and direct not only the production but also the worker’s working state. Similarly, a network of pyramidal hierarchized observation is formed in school through the hierarchical supervision of monitors, observers, tutors, intendants, etc. to normalize its members efficiently. With the help of hierarchical surveillance, power can exercise over the bodies without resorting to force or violence. 
3.1.2 Normalizing judgment 
As another practical instrument, normalizing judgment plays an important role in the operation of disciplinary power. “At the heart of all disciplinary systems it functions a small penal mechanism. It enjoys a kind of judicial privilege with its own laws, its specific offences, its particular forms of judgment.” (Foucault, 1977:177-178) That is, any “non-conforming” behaviour will be repressed and punished by the disciplines. Consequently, “The workshop, the school, the army were subject to a whole micro-penality of time (lateness, absences, interruptions of tasks), of activity (inattention, negligence, lack of zeal), of behaviour (impoliteness, disobedience), of speech (idle chatter, insolence), of the body (‘incorrect’ attitudes, irregular gestures, lack of cleanliness), of sexuality (impurity, indecency)” (ibid. 178). Finally, “each subject finds himself caught in a punishable, punishing university.” (ibid. 178) 
In disciplinary mechanism, individuals as well as their actions are placed on a ranked scale where they are compared with everyone else, so any disobedience or departure from the rules will be normalized. However, discipline does not only punish bad behaviours, but also reward good ones. Individuals distributed according to ranks or grades are encouraged to conform to the rules and behave well. All the behaviours are rendered in the category of being bad or being good. This normalizing judgment functions to compare, to differentiate, to hierarchize, to homogenize and to exclude. 
In short, disciplinary punishment aims neither to expiate nor simply to repress, but rather to “normalize”. “The disciplinary mechanisms secreted a ‘penalty of the norm’, which is irreducible in its principles and functioning of the traditional penalty of the law.” (ibid. 183) Along with hierarchical surveillance, normalizing judgment which emerges from the classical age is one of the principal techniques of power operating. 
3.1.3 The Examination 
According to Foucault, “the examination combines the techniques of an observing hierarchy and those of a normalizing judgment. It is a normalizing gaze, a Surveillance that makes it possible to qualify, to classify, and to punish” (Foucault, 1977:185). The examination links the formation of knowledge and the exercise of power by presenting a whole mechanism and makes them reinforce each other. 
First, the examination, which is an objectified ceremony where “subjects” are presented as “objects” to the surveillance of power, transforms the field of visibility into the domain of power. Second, it introduces individuals into the field of documentation. “The results of examinations are recorded in documents that provide detailed information about the individuals examined and allow power systems to control them (for example absentee records for schools, patients’ charts in hospitals).” (Gutting, 2005:86) Finally, the examination through supervision and documentation renders each individual into a describable and analyzable “case”. 
The examination demonstrates a new modality of power. Combining with hierarchical observation and normalizing judgment, it assures “the great disciplinary functions of distribution and classification, maximum extraction of forces and time, continuous genetic accumulation, optimum combination of aptitudes and, thereby, the fabrication of … individuality” (Foucault, 1977:192). 
In the eyes of Foucault, disciplinary mechanism is best exemplified by Bentham’s Panopticon, an architectural model which shows how people can be supervised and disciplined in an efficient way. In Discipline and Punish, Foucault portrays it like this: 
We know the principle on which it was based: at the periphery, an annular building; at the centre, a tower; this tower is pierced with wide windows that open onto the inner side of the ring; the peripheric building is divided into cells, each of which extends the whole width of the building; they have two windows, one on the inside, corresponding to the windows of the tower; the other, on the outside, allows the light to cross the cell from one end to the other. (Foucault, 1977:200) 
The annular cells are arranged in such a way that the inmates, such as a madman, a patient, a condemned man, a prisoner, a worker or a schoolboy, can be perfectly individualized and constantly visible. Each individual is confined in a fixed place where he can be seen by the surveillant but he cannot see others. He becomes “the object of information, never a subject in communication” (ibid. 200). The key effect of the Panopticon is the internalization of disciplinary observation, because the inmate who realizes he is always visible to the supervisor makes the constraint of power play upon himself spontaneously. In other words, he becomes his own overseer and will well behave as if the surveillant is still observing. 
According to Foucault, the Panopticon, viewed as “a generalizable model of functioning; a way of defining power relations in terms of the everyday life of men” (ibid. 205), can be applied in many institutions where the individuals need to be inspected, such as schools, hospitals, workshops, prisons, troops, etc.. It “serves to reform prisoners, but also to treat patients, to instruct schoolchildren, to confine the insane, to supervise workers, to put beggars and idlers to work” (ibid. 205). In the 17t h  and 18t h  centuries, disciplinary institutions modelled on the Panopticon gradually extend to the whole society and form what might be called in general the “disciplinary society”, although prison is considered the best place to realize the idea of the Panopticon. 
Consequently, bodies in the society will be manipulated, shaped and trained to obey, and become docile and useful. Through every pressure, restriction and requirement, one has to keep in conformity with the norms and disciplines. In Cloud Atlas, Aurora House and Nea So Copros serve as the image of the Panopticon, and the residents suffer from the same thing as the prisoners. In order to maintain their order and control the residents effectively, the administrators employ a series of disciplinary techniques, such as hierarchical observation, normalizing judgment and the examination, etc. to produce docile bodies. Through the analysis of the old in Aurora House and the clones in Nea So Copros, this chapter will explore Foucauldian panoptic society where disciplinary power successfully exercises and automatically functions on the whole social body. 
3.2 The Docile Bodies in Cloud Atlas 
3.2.1 The Aged in Aurora House 
The hero of the fourth story “The Ghastly Ordeal of Timothy Cavendish” Timothy is cheated by his brother and imprisoned in Aurora House. Being a nursing home for the elderly, Aurora House is originally expected by Timothy as a hotel but actually could be viewed as a version of the Panopticon where disciplinary power pervades. Aurora House is subject to a whole micro-penalty of time, activity, behaviour, speech and body, and any “non-conforming” behaviour will be repressed and punished by the administrators who have the power to execute an “infra-penalty” or an extralegal penalty. 
In terms of language, Nurse Noakes as the spokesman of Aurora House disciplines the words of its members. When Timothy wakes up and suddenly discovers that Nurse Noakes like a bargain hunter is rifling through his personal belongings, he angrily interrogates her. However, what he gets is not an apology, but a severe warning. According to Nurse Noakes, she is lenient enough because Timothy is new and she does not have him eat soap powder. Being surprised at the fact that a robber reprimands her victim for bad language, Timothy launches another verbal attack. Nurse Noakes comes over to his bed and slaps him hard across the chops. As a power subject, she will not endure any offensive language in Aurora House and no one could talk to her in that way. Otherwise, he/she must accept harsh punishment. Such a painful lesson teaches Timothy and other inmates not to violate the rules of Nurse Noakes, instead, to say what she wants to hear only. 
When it comes to the discipline about time, the members must act to a strict timetable, for example, breakfast is eight sharp and none for the tardy. It means if there is some lateness, the inmates will lose their breakfast. As to behaviour, smoking firstly is discouraged in Aurora House and Nurse Noakes will confiscate the residents’ cigars. After suffering harassment at the hands of Mrs Judd and realizing the verbal controversy is not effective, Timothy attempts to run out of the door. He smashes a release catch with a little hammer, opens the fire door and seemingly becomes a freeman over Mrs Judd’s protests. However, what is waiting for him is not the freedom, but the penalty.  
In one powerful yank my trousers were pulled from my waist—was he going to bugger me? What he did was even less pleasant. He laid me on the body of his mowing machine, pinned me down with one hand, and caned me with a bamboo cane in the other. The pain cracked across my unfleshy shanks, once, twice, again-again, again-again, again-again! (Mitchell 179) 
His first prison break is stopped by a security guard and suppressed by corporal punishment and insulting treatment, which forces him to temporarily accept the fact that Aurora House is the place where he cannot escape from. 
After the penalty, Timothy is sent to his room without breakfast. When plotting vengeance, litigation and torture, he inspects his cell. “Door, locked from outside, no keyhole. Window that opened only six inches. Heavy-duty sheets made of egg-carton fibres with plastic under-sheet. Armchair, washable seat-cover. Moppable carpet. ‘Easy-wipe’ wallpaper. ‘En-suite’ bathroom: soap, shampoo, flannel, ratty towel, no window.” (Mitchell 180) Besides, the bathroom is designed for disabled people and it is all rounded edges and fitted with handrails. The environment and design of Timothy’s cell remind the readers the Panopticon, a building designed by the eighteenth-century English philosopher Jeremy Bentham, aiming to control people and achieve the maximum utility with the least cost. In fact, each individual in Aurora House is confined in a fixed place and controlled by the management. 
Timothy settles into his new surroundings while still trying to plot a way out. One day, he wakes up and suddenly realizes that he loses his ability to speak, move and memorize. His calves are raised and his arse is wiped with a brisk cold wet cloth, which is full of excrement, faeces and cloying. Mrs Judd tells him he has “a teeny-weeny stroke”. It is true that his stroke is relatively light, but the month that follows is the most mortifying of his life. He speaks like a spastic and his arms are feelingless. He cannot wipe his own arse. His mind shambles in fog yet is aware of his witlessness, and ashamed. In this way, feral Timothy is beaten again by the strategy of Dr. Upward and Nurse Noakes. 
It takes Timothy a month to recover from the stroke, but he is really stuck in Aurora House. Later, Timothy learns from Veronica that his stroke is induced because he crosses Nurse Noakes. The behaviour of Timothy is rendered in the field of being bad, which is disadvantageous for the operation and authority of Aurora House, and the non-conformity is the distinctive reason for disciplinary punishment. That is, the stroke which harms his health and tortures his will for a long time is just a kind of disciplinary techniques and functions as the normalizing judgment. In order to normalize the behaviour of Timothy and force him to be docile like the other inmates, Nurse Noakes lynches him by dropping overpowering drug into his food. In fact, in the rules of Aurora House, if someone’s behaviour is at odds with the requirement of power subjects, he/she will be medicated. 
The application of surveillance camera and two-way phone in Aurora House is omnipresent, which restricts the thoughts and behaviours of the residents. When they attempt to carry out their escape plan, they always think the surveillance camera would spot them and the guard Withers would pick them up before they succeed. According to Foucault, the operation of disciplinary mechanism must resort to the surveillance and the major effect of the Panopticon is the internalization of disciplinary observation. Because the inmates never know whether or when they are observed, they will turn into the principle of his own subjection. In other words, the inmates in Aurora House become their own overseers and will well behave as though the surveillant is still observing. 
Being a political anatomy of detail, discipline, “the specific technique of a power that regards individuals both as objects and as instruments of its exercise”, “a modest, suspicious power, which functions as a calculated, but permanent economy” (Foucault, 1977:171), plays an indispensable role in the operation of Aurora House. Power subjects watch over Aurora House, where the regulations endowed with punishment regulate individual behaviour. The omnipresent surveillance permeates into the daily life of the residents, governs their thoughts, determines their behaviour, and causes disbelief and alienation between them. As a result, most of the old there is docile under the operation of disciplinary mechanism, although eventually Timothy with his three partners successfully flees.  
3.2.2 The Clones in Nea So Copros 
As Foucault points out, not only does the disciplinary mechanism become a common practice for numerous institutions, but also it begins to seep out from the institutional location to infiltrate those non-institutional spaces and populations. Thus, the so-called disciplinary society comes into being, and Nea So Copros in Cloud Atlas is such a disciplinary society filled with docile bodies. In Nea So Copros, discipline as “a technique of power which provides procedures for training or for coercing bodies (individual and collective)” (Smart 80) exerts its influence on the fabricants.  
In Cloud Atlas, Mitchell fictionalizes the setting where the story “An Orison of Sonmi~451” takes place Nea So Copros, a dystopian futuristic state that is gradually revealed to be in Korea and to be a totalitarian state that has evolved from corporate culture, which enslaves the fabricants to do various jobs. In this episode, the panoptic eye3, which functions as a kind of surveillance or discipline, exists not only in Papa Song’s, but also in Taemosan University and the abbey, even everywhere in the society. In order to maintain social order and control the fabricants effectively, the purebloods employ a series of disciplinary techniques, hoping to produce docile and useful bodies that like walking corpses have no freedom of positive action and independent thinking. 
In Papa Song’s, the disciplinary techniques are perfectly utilized and controlling over time is also very significant for disciplining body. According to Foucault, “these were always meticulous, often minute, techniques, but they had their importance: because they defined a certain mode of detailed political investment of the body, a ‘new micro-physics’ of power” (Foucault, 177:139). Papa Song’s works out an extremely detailed timetable for the fabricants to do everything, such as working, praying, and it does not have the slightest possibility to be altered by anybody.  
The image of Papa Song, the highest representative of disciplinary power in Papa Song’s, is mentioned repeatedly in the narrative. For the fabricant servers, Papa Song who represents supremacy and discipline embodies the power and reminds them of his omnipresent surveillance. He usually performs antics for the amusement of the dinners, but in the eyes of fabricant servers, he stands for power and authority. Undoubtedly, Papa Song who carries out the function of “seeing” is a surveillant positioned on the “tower” of panoptical mechanism. It seems that all the fabricants could not dodge his sight whenever they are working or relaxing. Whatever the servers are doing, they can feel the observation of Papa Song. In this way, discipline could maintain strict standards to bring all the fabricant servers into an identical whole. If they obey the rules of Papa Song, they would get his love; if they fail to do so, they would never get to Xultation. The judgment of Papa Song is so important that the fabricants become their own overseer and will well behave even though Papa Song is not supervising. In fact, Papa Song, an inane hologram inspiring such awe in the servers, is only a kind of jugglery produced by light. Along with Seer and Aides, Papa Song perfectly fulfills the function of hierarchical observation. 
To sum up, Papa Song’s is a place where disciplinary power swings its power and disciplines the body to the upmost, because the situation in Papa Song’s is a perfect duplicate of Panopticon image, which is considered as the most ideal form of disciplinary society. Foucault points out, “it reverses the principle of the dungeon; […] Full lighting and the eye of a supervisor capture better than darkness, which ultimately protected. Visibility is a trap”. (ibid. 200) In Papa Song’s, every movement of the clones has to be exposed in the vision of the surveillants, which forms such a pattern of gazing and being gazed. 
Later, being a successor of Yoona~939, Sonmi~451 who gradually shakes her faith in every aspect of what she held to be true becomes the new laboratory specimen and is taken to Taemosan University “to reduce experimental contamination”. Inspired by Wing~027, she realizes the significance of intelligence and knowledge. During the summer recess, Sonmi~451 never sets foot outside her master’s lab but her mind travels the length, breadth and depth of their culture. She devours the twelve seminal texts, but in fact, her library download requests have already brought herself to the attention of Dr. Mephi. That is to say, all of her actions in the lab are observed and known by Dr. Mephi, the executive of the norms in the pureblood-dominated society. Mephi also carries out the function of “gazing”, surveilling and discipling Sonmi~451’s behaviour, and rectifying or punishing her when her words or actions against the norms formulated by the pureblood. 
In the abbey, a place serving “as shelter for a colony of dispossessed purebloods who prefer scraping a little out of the mountains to the untermensch4 sinks” (Mitchell 346), Sonmi~451 encounters a group of special men, including Uyghur dissidents, hungry farmers, once-respectable conurbdwellers, unemployable deviants and the penniless by mental illness. They bicker and grieve as people will, but they do it in a community. It can be said that it is the place in which Sonmi~451 dreams to live. Nevertheless, it is in this place that surveillance also exists. The abbess by surveillance knows Sonmi~451 as a fabricant is impersonating a pureblood. To some extent, the success of disciplinary power derives no doubt from the use of the omnipresent observation. 
Finally, it turns out that everything that happens to her is in fact instigated by the government, to create an artificial enemy figure to encourage the oppression of fabricants by purebloods. In other words, from birth to death, the fabricants can never avoid the surveillance of the purebloods. In order to make the fabricants docile and useful, incessant observation and control upon them are in bad need. 
“The exercise presupposes a mechanism that coerces by means of observation.”  (Foucault, 1977:170) The eyes of power are a part of power operation in disciplinary society. It is a gazing eye which penetrates and never lets anything pass in the panoptical mechanism. It persistently takes effect between the surveillants and the surveilled. Under the observation of Papa Song and the whole society, the fabricants may strive to make an excellent performance and get more and more docile and useful. 
3.3 Summary 
In Cloud Atlas, in order to stay in power and maintain themselves a dominant party, the authorities of Aurora House and Nea So Copros execute disciplinary power over the bodies of the aged as well as the clones and try to transform them to be docile and useful so as to assure their leading position. 
Aurora House is subject to a whole micro-penalty of time, activity, behaviour, speech and body, and any “non-conforming” behaviour will be repressed and punished. The omnipresent surveillance permeates into the daily life of the residents, governs their thoughts, determines their behaviour, and produces obedient and subdued individuals. In Nea So Copros, no one could completely control power in a safe way. The chairman, who is at the top of the hierarchical observation of government, is considered as the most powerful person in Nea So Copros and a representative of its power and authority. However, as a ruler, he has his own worry. He is frightened by social revolution launched by the clones, as the operator of power mechanism, he is also a victim disciplined by power. 
Similarly, the Seer and Aides also exercise disciplinary power over the clones. They take charge of the clone servers, watch their every move and report to their superior. Nevertheless, they themselves are also confined to a limited space and are supervised by others as well. In this way, Nea So Copros in the novel becomes what Foucault calls a “carceral” society. 
In the novel, the aged and the clones are not the only bodies that are disciplined and confined in Aurora House or Nea So Copros. In these prison-like societies, everybody is restricted in a limited space and subjected to a certain discipline. Even the ruler himself is also controlled and becomes a victim of disciplinary power. Timothy thinks he has fallen into a prison which he cannot escape from. Indeed, in the novel, not only Timothy, but everyone in the society is in the manipulation of disciplinary power. People cannot extricate themselves from it but only become part of it. 
From the above analysis, it can be seen that both Aurora House and Nea So Copros in Cloud Atlas are disciplinary society, or even a prison in which bodies, especially the aged and clones are restricted and kept under surveillance. However, it does not mean that people here are totally docile. The following chapter is going to explore how the protagonists in the novel, especially Autua, Sonmi~451 and Luisa resist the power and rules imposed by others and then shape a different and better self. 


4. Body Governed by Oneself in CloudAtlas
As analyzed above, the body is defined and controlled by discourse and disciplinary power and the aged in Aurora House as well as the clones in Nea So Copros become docile and useful under the influence of disciplinary techniques in the prison-like society. However, power and resistance are always co-existential. In other words, body is not only the passive power objects, but also the resistant with the ability to subvert and self-shape. In Cloud Atlas, there are also many individuals who resist and struggle in a number of ways rather than completely succumb to the rules imposed by others. With their own efforts and the help of others, such protagonists as Autua, Sonmi~451 and Luisa overturn the order established by the Maori, the pureblood and Seaboard Incorporated and then shape a new and better self. In a much broader sense, for modern people living in the society permeated with power relations, the necessity and significance of the spirit of resisting and self-shaping should not be ignored as well. 
4.1 Resistance and Self-shaping of Body
In Foucault’s view, power operation penetrates all over the social fields, such as hospitals, factories, schools, armies and laboratories, and therefore the so-called disciplinary society where people live as if they are in a huge prison is formed. Bodies existing in this society must endure the description and discipline of social norms, regulations, agreements, etc.. Even their privacy could not keep out of the gaze of the power system. In this respect, it seems that power works in all directions and the control of power towards body is inevitable. 
Nevertheless, this does not mean that power is totally irresistible or individuals are just passive recipients, instead, the individuals could through their own efforts resist the power exerted upon them, reverse the power relations, become the dominant party and shape a different and better self. According to Foucault, power relations “are not univocal; they define innumerable points of confrontation, focuses of instability, each of which has its own risks of conflict, of struggles, and of an at least temporary inversion of the power relations” (Foucault, 1977:28). In other words, the fact that power is a relationship between social forces makes it unavoidably fragile, unstable and hence alterable and reversible and can be challenged at any moment. 
“Where there is power, there is resistance.” (ibid. 95) Foucault believes that there is a close relationship between power and resistance. In his opinion, without resistance, power is absent, exactly as what Smart expounds in Michel Foucault, “resistance is present everywhere power is exercised; the network of power relations is paralleled by a multiplicity of forms of resistance” (Smart 130). “In order for there to be a relation where power is exercised, there has to be someone who resists” (Mills 40), Mills also views it like this. That is, as long as power is present, resistance will not be impossible. It can be seen that power and resistance (counter-power) presuppose and generate each other. 
Because ‘power’ is multiple and ubiquitous, the struggle against it must be localized. Equally, however, because it is a network and not a collection of isolated points, each localized struggle induces effects on the entire network. Struggle cannot be totalized —a single, centralized, hierarchized organization setting out to seize a single, centralized, hierarchized power; but it can be serial, that is, in terms of horizontal links between one point of struggle and another. (Sheridan, 1980:137-138) 
In an interview entitled “Body/Power”, Foucault states that “what had made power strong becomes used to attack it. Power, after investing itself in the body, finds itself exposed to a counter-attack in that same body”. (Gordon, 1980:43) It could be perceived that Foucault’s view of the interaction of body and power becomes more positive by paying more attention to resistance and self-shaping instead of simple passive oppression. Body in power relations functions not only as passive receivers, but also as the place where power is exercised and resisted. That is to say, on one hand, power could describe and discipline the body; on the other hand, there is still vast possibility for individuals to resist and then self-shape. 
Foucault turns his attention to the aesthetics of existence appearing in the period of ancient Greece and Rome in his final phase of life and asserts that the existence of an individual should be artistic by looking himself as a work of art to create and carve. In this process of self-shaping, body is the starting point and individuals should concern themselves. Foucault points out that this aesthetics of existence which means a practice, a style of liberty and freedom should be advocated in contemporary society. He emphasizes aesthetics of existence with the aim of shaping oneself into free individual with one’s own efforts and others’ help is one kind of self-conscious and unbidden behaviour which is closely related to one’s body. 
In The History of Sexuality, Foucault profoundly explores the aesthetics of existence with abundant materials. Although Foucault discovers the way of an individual’s self-shaping from the sexual activities of the ancients, it does not mean the kind of sensual life without thoughts. What people should concern more is not the relationships with others or the society, but the “self-relation”. 
a matter of placing the imperative ‘know thyself’ — which to us appears so characteristic of our civilization — back in the much broader interrogation that serves as its explicit or implicit context: What should one do with oneself? What work should be carried out on the self? How should one ‘govern oneself’ by performing actions in which one is oneself the objective of those actions, the domain in which they are brought to bear, the instrument they employ, and the subject that acts? (Foucault, 2000:87) 
An individual can also gain his identity with his conscience and self-awareness, though he has to live under others’ control and influence. There are two forms of relations between individuals: one is the controlling and being controlled relationship between an individual and others, the other is the relationship between an able individual and himself. Therefore, in modern society, individuals should try to calmly deal with the challenges and difficulties of life and arrange their own lifestyle instead of being controlled by others. In a word, beyond the description and discipline, the body could consciously choose its own pattern of life.  
In the light of Foucault’s thoughts, the following sections intend to explore the resistance and self-shaping of the characters in Cloud Atlas. As analyzed above, Aurora House and Nea So Copros in the novel are like the disciplinary society and the individuals in these places are controlled and disciplined all the time. With various disciplinary techniques of the power subjects, the oppressed bodies might get more and more docile and useful. However, not everyone yields to the power. Such characters as Autua, Sonmi~451 and Luisa Rey don’t succumb to the power but resist in one way or another and then shape a different and better self. 
4.2 The Self-shaped Bodies in Cloud Atlas 
4.2.1 Autua 
Being the last living member of the Moriori people, Autua lives as a slave at the hands of an invading New Zealand Maori called Kupaka. In order to get rid of the shackles of slavery and change his own life and fate, he works industriously for his master until he wins enough trust to effect his escape. He tries again and again, but unfortunately, he is always gotten back. After being whipped, he sets foot on his journey of escape once again by boarding the vessel Prophetess and hiding himself in the chamber of Adam, who is made to believe that parasites are ravaging his brain by Dr. Goose who intends to slowly kill him by poisoning. Autua in turn saves Adam from this malignant doctor. In this way, Autua breaks away from the control of slavery and reconstructs a new self. 
The rebellious consciousness of Autua derives from his ten-year experience as a sailor. Moriori are welcome because of their seal-hunting and swimming feats, and his uncle Koche who once put out to sea helps him ship on a French whaler as an apprentice. In his subsequent career at sea, he catches sight of the ice-ranges of Antarctica, whales turned to sperm-oil, a giant tortoise, grand buildings, parks, horse-drawn carriages, ladies in bonnets and the miracles of civilization. Everywhere he observes that casual brutality lighter races show the darker, which sows the seeds of freedom and equality in the deepest place of his heart. The fact that Autua sees too much of the world dooms that he will not be a good slave. 
In order to smoothly implement his escape plan, he has to work hard to slacken the vigilance of his master Kupaka. He hides in a secret place, but a year later he is recaptured. At that time, Moriori slaves are too scarce to be indiscriminately slaughtered. Autua escapes again and during his second spell of freedom he is baptised and turned to the Lord. In the meanwhile, he is granted secret asylum by Mr D’Arnoq for some months, at no little risk to the latter. Kupaka’s men catch up with him after one and a half years, but this time the mercurial chieftain evinces a respect for Autua’s spirit. After a retributive lashing, Kupaka appoints him as fisherman for his own table. Thus employed, Autua lets another year go by until one afternoon he finds a rare moeeka fish, which is too supervirulent to eat. He tells Kupaka’s wife this king of fish could be eaten by a king of men and shows her how to prepare it for her husband. During that night’s feasting, Autua sneaks from the encampment and gets to deserted Pit Island known as “Rangiauria” in Moriori and revered as mankind’s birthplace. 
This attempt wins Autua the longest sojourn of freedom among all his escape experiences by then. He subsists in his own paradise on wild celery, watercress, eggs, berries, an occasional young boar, makes a fire only under cover of darkness or mist and lives thus for several years. In his eyes, “Nights, ancestors visited. Days, I yarned tales of Maui to birds, & birds yarned sea-tales to I.” (Mitchell 33) What is more, the hope that Kupaka at least has met a harsh punishment comforts him in his unbearable solitude. Although life on the island is lonely and tough, Autua is free and joyful after all. Unfortunately, good times do not last long. Mr Walker comes to Pit Island, accidentally finds signs of habitation and sees Kupaka’s old canoe. Two days later, a large hunting party rows there from the mainland. To Autua’s surprise, his old enemy Kupaka is grizzled but very much alive and shouting war-chants. Originally, it is a greedy dog that stole moeeka from kitchen and died, not the Maori Kupaka. 
Being escorted back means another unsuccessful resistance of Autua who is hoarfrosted with many harsh years, and what’s waiting for him is a public flogging. His body bound naked to an A-frame shudders with each excoriating lash and his back is like a vellum of bloody runes. From Kupaka’s point of view, the fleeing of Autua brings a certain loss of his property and stands for a great challenge to his authority, so he chooses to show his power through severe punishment. However, the merciless techniques will only inspire the oppressed to resist and fight and slaves’ desire for freedom is getting strong. Therefore, Autua’s struggle continues. 
On the night before the departure of Prophetess, Mr D’Arnoq helps Autua board the ship and hides him in Adam’s cabin. Although at the start Adam is reluctant to give Autua a hand, he still promises to approach the captain at breakfast and try for a job for him. It is worth mentioning that it is a near-impossible task because at that time if constructing a case for an Aboriginal stowaway aboard an English schooner, his discoverer or cabin-mate will encounter a charge of conspiracy. Finally, with the help of Adam, Autua by virtue of his rich experiences and proficient skills gets a job as a sailor and begins his journey to freedom. It should be noticed that the decision-making to assist Autua is a significant turning point both in Autua’s and Adam’s life. During the whole voyage, Dr. Goose, who is Adam’s only friend aboard the ship, diagnoses Adam’s injuries as a fatal parasite and recommends a course of treatment. Later, Adam falls further sick, realizing at the last minute that Dr. Goose is poisoning him to steal his possessions, but he is rescued by Autua. Having been saved by a slave, he resolves to devote his life to the abolitionist movement. 
In short, Autua’s life is full of various ups and downs. From a free man, to a slave, to an individual with resistance consciousness, Autua struggles to get rid of the shackles of slavery. In the face of power’s suppression, his courage and insistence shows the determination to gain freedom and dignity. With his own unremitting efforts and the help of D’Arnoq and Adam, Autua eventually achieves his resistance to power and shapes a free and better self. What’s more, it is Autua who changes Adam into an abolitionist and promotes his self-shaping. 
4.2.2 Sonmi~451 
As a genetically engineered fabricant, Sonmi~451 is one of many fabricants grown to work at, among other places, a fast-food restaurant called Papa Song’s. The fabricants there are treated as slave labour by the pureblood, who stunt the fabricants’ consciousness through chemical manipulation of Soap and set Papa Song’s investment takes them twelve years to repay. Later, she becomes self-aware or “ascended” and learns the slavery nature of Nea So Copros. At the rebels’ encouragement, she willingly goes off on the path of rebellion. Although at last she is arrested and executed, she still believes that the idea of resistance has been deeply rooted in the minds of the clones and the reign of the pureblood will be finally overthrown. 
It has to be said that it is the guidance of Yoona~939 that speeds up the awakening of Sonmi~451. As a result of her ascension, Yoona~939’s language then grows more complex and sounds like the pureblood. She often takes pleasure by pretending to be an ill-mannered pureblood, yawning, chewing, sneezing and acting drunk. Above all, she also shows something nobody else knows to Sonmi~451 and puts forward various doubts about the sureties of the fabricant world. “How could Papa Song stand on a plinth in Chongmyo Plaza Papa Song’s and walk the Xultation’s beaches at the same time? Why were fabricants born into debt but pureblood not? Who decided Papa Song’s Investment took twelve years to repay? Why not eleven? Six? One?” (Mitchell 198) These strong doubts fundamentally shake Sonmi~451’s faith in every aspect of what she held to be true. For Sonmi~451, Yoona~939 is a veritable pathfinder, though shot in her escape. 
Sonmi~451 becomes a new experimental article in place of Yoona~939 and begins her own ascension. She possesses intelligence and consciousness with her language evolved and curiosity about Outside increased. Consequently, she suffers alienation because other servers avoid her, just as they have done with Yoona~939. Several months later, Sonmi~451 encounters individuals from a rebel underground who draw her out of the cloistered fabricant world. It is the first choice of her life to repay her Investment in a new way and come to Taemosan University. Although it is not much of a choice, Sonmi~451 accomplishes the first step from Papa Song’s to the Outside and changes her established course of life. 
From then on, Sonmi~451 is mastered by an ignoramus postgraduate called Boom-Sook Kim and stranded in his lab. Inspired by a disasterman Wing~027, she realizes the significance of intelligence and knowledge. Through a Sony (an electronic reading in “The Orison of Sonmi~451”) downloaded with every single autodidact module in advance, Sonmi~451 graduates from elementary school. By the sixth month she completes middle school curriculum and in those nine months her sentience is skyrocketing. One humid afternoon, because of his master Min-Sic’s arrogant carelessness, Wing~027 dies, which makes Sonmi~451 feel furious. Fury forges a steel will and that day is the real first step to her resistance. 
During the summer recess, Sonmi~451 never sets foot outside Boom-Sook’s lab but her mind travels the length, breadth and depth of their culture in those fifty days. She devours the twelve seminal texts, such as Jong-Il’s Seven Dialects, Prime Chairman’s Founding of Nea So Copros, Admiral Yeng’s History of the Skirmishes and so on. On Sextet Eve, Sonmi~451 is treated by three postgraduates as a target to shoot for seeking pleasure until Dr. Mephi appears and stops them. Thus, she leaves the lab of Boom-Sook and lives in a new home. In fact, her library download requests have been already found and brought herself to the attention of Dr. Mephi. The interdepartmental squabbles break out when Dr. Mephi reports his findings. Finally, the Unanimity wins a stop-gap compromise: she is permitted to continue her self-education, observed from a distance in her illusory free-will, until a consensus of opinion could be reached. 
As the first stabilized ascendant, Sonmi~451 could raise a lot of money for her new masters. As such, the university enrolls her as a foundation student, but the real lesson is just humiliation. The experiments she undergoes daily remind her of her true status and suppress her spirit. She begins to think if she could not use it to better her existence, her knowledge means nothing. Because her curiosity is dying, Dr. Mephi asks Hae-Joo Im to cheer her up. She revisits Papa Song’s with her guide Hae-Joo and is surprised to find that her memory about that place is so misleading. Papa Song, an inane hologram inspiring such awe in the servers, is only a kind of jugglery produced by light. She gradually wakes up to the slavery nature of Papa Song’s and she is actually a slave, but not a simple server. 
It turns out that Hae-Joo who has paid such a crippling price to protect an experimental fabricant Sonmi~451 is a member of the Union, known as a rebellious organization. In order to get the cooperation of Sonmi~451 as an interlocutor between Union and the ascending fabricants, the general Apis lets Hae-Joo escort her to Papa Song’s golden ark, which is claimed as a ship to carry the retired servers who has finished twelve-year repayment to Xultation in Hawaii. In fact, before their eyes opens out a slaughterhouse production line. The butcher-like workers snip off collars, strip clothes, shave follicles, peel skin, offcut hands and legs, slice off meat, spoon organs so as to produce liquefied biological substance for incubators and Soap for clones. Additionally, leftover “reclaimed proteins” will be used to produce Papa Song food provided for the customers. Sonmi~451 learns the truth that the fabricants are not released after serving their time at work, but killed and recycled into food and more fabricants. 
She writes an abolitionist Declarations that tells the truth about their society and calls for rebellion to teach the ascended fabricants rights, harness their anger and channel their energies. Although she knows everything that happened to her is in fact instigated by the government, to create an artificial enemy figure to encourage the oppression of fabricants by purebloods, she still cooperates with the conspiracy. Because she believes it is very hard to judge the winning or losing, though she has predicted her ending of capture and death. “If losers can xploit what their adversaries teach them, yes, losers can become winners in the long term.” (ibid. 234) The resistance of Sonmi~451 is germinated when Yoona~939 is shot, nurtured by Boom-Sook, strengthened by Mephi and birthed in Papa Song’s slaughtership. It is Nea So Copros that teaches Sonmi~451 to resist and accelerates the reproduction of her rebellious ideas, to some extent, she is the real winner. 
Like Yoona~939, Sonmi~451 also chooses death over slavery and becomes “a paragraph in the history of the struggle against corpocracy” (ibid. 335). However, the successor will never be killed, no matter how many revolutionists Nea So Copros kill. Sonmi~451 makes other fabricants know “all revolutions are the sheerest fantasy until they happen; then they become historical inevitabilities” (ibid. 342). So long as the fabricants resist together, the slavery in Nea So Copros can be overturned. 
4.2.3 Luisa 
Luisa Rey, a young female columnist from Spyglass magazine, unveils the conspiracy that the new HYDRA nuclear reactor at Swannekke Island supported by Seaboard Incorporated is not as safe as the official line. In order to explore the truth and resist the power of the oil tycoons, she almost pays for her own life. After a series of failures and efforts, she succeeds in finding out the hard evidence and breaking the order constructed by Seaboard Incorporated. In other words, she changes from a common journalist to a truth teller and shapes a special and better self. 
It is in a lift that Luisa gets the source from Rufus Sixsmith, an atomic engineer working as an inspector at Seaboard. While they are stuck between floors during a power blackout, Rufus attempts to open his mouth to tell her everything, including the whitewashing, the blackmailing and the corruption in the company, but the lift suddenly back to normal and the restored light get his resolve crumbled away. Even so, Rufus knows Luisa is willing to lay her life on the line for her journalistic integrity. That is the reason why Rufus chooses to trust Luisa and leads her to go on the path of resistance and pursuit. 
With the aim of proving the source given by Rufus, Luisa visits Seaboard Incorporated on Swannekke Island. Through the eyes of Joseph, readers know that the nuclear plant is indeed not as safe as the company advertises it to be. According to Rufus, although Seaboard CEO Alberto Grimaldi announces that fifty million federal dollars will be poured into the reactor and thousands of new jobs will be created, the hydrogen build-up will blow the roof off the containment chamber and prevailing winds will shower radiation over California. Rufus has proved it, but for the sake of covering up the truth, Seaboard attempts to bribe him and then tries intimidation. Actually, all the scientists in charge of this project are very doubtful about the HYDRA-Zero reactor. The threat of Seaboard forces eleven out of twelve scientists to forget the existence of a nine-month inquiry, and only Rufus resists and gets away. To her disappointment, the adventures of Luisa at seaboard win nothing. 
Because there is no enough evidence, Luisa’s article on the cover-up at Seaboard does not make any progress. What is worse, Rufus is murdered at Buenas Yerbas International Airport’s Bon Voyage Hotel, though the spokeswoman for Seaboard says Rufus has taken his own life. For Seaboard, Rufus’ role is to give the project his imprimatur, but he identifies lethal design flaws. He writes a report to condemn the HYDRA-Zero and require Swannekke B should be taken off-line and is getting ready to go public. Luisa learns that the businessmen in charge of the plant are conspiring to cover up the dangers and are assassinating potential whistleblowers. As a result, death is what the truth costs Rufus. 
In order to find out hard evidence of Seaboard’s plot and Rufus’ death, Luisa revisits Swannekke Island. She gets more information from Isaac Sachs, who secretly hides the copy of Rufus’ report. Out of conscience and the sense of justice, Isaac leaves the report in Luisa’s VW before his being transferred. Therefore, Luisa tries to drive away stealthily and then publish her findings. However, Bill Smoke, a Seaboard-hired assassin who has been following her pushes her car along with Rufus’ incriminating report off a bridge. At the same time, Isaac, “the sneak” in the eyes of businessmen at Seaboard, is killed in a bomb blast. With the help of Hester, Luisa escapes from the sinking car, but is still pursued by Bill. Furthermore, the report which she almost pays for her life disappears in the sea. Nevertheless, Luisa still does not give up resisting Seaboard and uncovering the truth. 


It turns out Joseph is a friend of Luisa’s late father and the only insider at Seaboard who does not want her dead, because many years ago, Lester Rey saved Joseph’s life. Luisa returns to the home of her mother and stepfather to momentarily hide from the chase of Seaboard, but the killer Bill follows her to the fundraiser organized by her mother and tries to kill her without a trace. Later, Seaboard purchases Spyglass magazine so that it can manage public opinion caused by the findings of Luisa. To make matters worse, Luisa becomes the one who is kicked out and she cannot expose the conspiracy by virtue of her periodical office. Meanwhile, the change of Joseph’s role from insider to liability makes him walk the plank. Of course, in a sense, it is a golden chance for him to exit a blood-stained stage. 
From then on, Luisa becomes a freelance and works on behalf of the truth. Although she knows the risk she is exposing herself to, she still chooses to resist the order imposed by Seaboard. At the suggestion of the chief editor Grelsch, she realizes she can ask Fran Peacock at the Western Messenger for help. At that time, Luisa receives a safety-deposit key from Rufus and a short note tells the exact location of the report. Nevertheless, after she arrives at the bank, Fay Li takes the key, opens the safety-deposit box, discovers the Rufus report, but is suddenly blown up by the bomb. Without a doubt, the killer Bill destroys the efforts of Luisa again. 
After the explosion, the flunkies of Seaboard try to kidnap Luisa, but Joseph comes to her assistance. To elude capture, Luisa and Joseph rush into an underworld sweatshop and then escape by subway train. Later, they meet Rufus’ niece, Megan Sixsmith, who tells them Rufus keeps academic papers, data, notes, and early drafts on his yacht Starfish for future reference. Megan is sure that Rufus has a copy of his report aboard. When they find out the report in Starfish, Bill comes and shoots Joseph. At stake, the dying Joseph kills Bill and rescues Luisa. At last, she gets the Rufus Report, the hard evidence of the corrupt corporate leaders. With the help of Fran Peacock at the Western Messenger, the conspiracy of Seaboard Incorporated is finally edging into the light. 
As a common journalist, Luisa cannot get rid of the fetter of power relations. In the process of investigating the conspiracy of Seaboard Incorporated, she meets kinds of difficulties and obstructions. However, she never gives up, instead, with an indomitable spirit, she discloses the truth, promotes her career and even shapes a better self. In the eyes of others, she is not “a fucking gossip columnist in a magazine that like no-one ever reads” (Mitchell 91) any more, but a truth teller full of courage and the sense of justice. Besides, it is worth mentioning that the help of Rufus, Joseph and Megan is important, and they are also fighters who resist the power of Seaboard Incorporated. That is to say, people can resist power and shape a better self, but both individual efforts and the help of others are indispensable. 
4.3 Summary 
Body in power relations functions not only as passive power object, but also as the place where power is exercised and resisted. In other words, on one hand, power could define and discipline the body; on the other hand, there is still vast possibility for individuals to resist and then self-shape. In Cloud Atlas, many characters do not yield to power but find a way to free and reconstruct themselves. For example, Autua, Sonmi~451 and Luisa respectively resist to the order imposed by others and then accomplish the process of self-shaping. 
Being the last living member of the Moriori people, Autua wants to get rid of the shackles of slavery and change his own fate, and constantly effects his escape plan. Although being caught back several times, he never gives up the eagerness to freedom. With the help of others, he eventually frees himself and gets a job as a sailor. What is more, Autua in turn saves Adam and accelerates the decision of Adam to devote his life to the abolitionist movement. 
Sonmi~451, a clone server, is enslaved by the pureblood. She gradually unveils the truth that the fabricants are actually enslaved and slaughtered. Although she understands everything that happened to her is instigated by the government, she still believes the idea of resistance has been deeply rooted in the minds of the clones and the reign of the pureblood will be finally overthrown. Calmly facing death means that Sonmi~451 gets rid of the shackles of slavery towards body and overturns the master-slave relationship with the pureblood. 
Similarly, a journalist Luisa uncovers the conspiracy that a new nuclear reactor is not as safe as the official line. In order to explore the truth and resist the power of Seaboard Incorporated, she almost pays for her own life. Finally, she succeeds in finding out the hard evidence and subverting the rules constructed by oil tycoons. That is to say, she shapes a special and better self through individual efforts and the help of others. 
In a word, body is not only the passive power object, but also the resistant with the ability to subvert and self-shape. To some extent, such suffering individuals in Cloud Atlas symbolize all mankind. Their dilemma and struggle is not only that of imaginary figures but also that of people in modern society. People in modern society should also learn the necessity and significance of positive resistance and self-shaping to shape a different and better self when facing the challenges and difficulties in life. 


5. Conclusion
 As an outstanding British novelist, David Mitchell is good at representing the universal survival condition and inner strength of human beings. He believes people possess the capacity to determine their existence through respective choice and struggle. With common people as the main subject, Mitchell's works unveil the living dilemma of modern people in the society permeated with power relations. In Cloud Atlas, such protagonists as Adam, Robert, Luisa, Timothy, Sonmi}4_51 and Zachry are suffering individuals who, according to Mitchell, symbolize all mankind. Their predicament and endeavour is not only that of imaginary figures but also that of people in modern society.
    Michel Foucault as a great philosopher is well-known for his body thoughts. He views body as a combination of the flesh existing as an individual and the spirit constructed by social and individual factors. On one hand, discourse power selects bodies to suppress and exclude; on the other hand, disciplinary power involves in the way of controlling and managing bodies. However, individuals can also resist and shape a better self through personal efforts and the help of others. Foucault's theory about the exclusion and discipline of power mechanism towards the body and the resistance and self-shaping of individuals provides a fresh perspective to interpret and appreciate Cloud Atlas.
    Both of Mitchell and Foucault are concerned for the existence predicament in an alienated society which is like a huge prison. They care about the marginalized group and sympathize with the weak, such as the mad, the non-heterosexual, and the aged and so on. It is Foucault's body thoughts that lead readers to step into the deeper comprehension of Cloud Atlas. In the novel, the body is always defined and excluded by discourse power, and the mad, the non-heterosexual and the inferior (the Moriori, the valley folk and the fabricants) as power objects are suppressed, enslaved and even eliminated. The aged as well as the clones are placed in an all-encompassing mechanism of hierarchical observation, normalizing judgment, the examination, etc.The whole society is like a panopticon where the surveillance is omnipresent no matter it is in nursing home, restaurant, college, abbey or society. In this way, bodies in Aurora House and Nea So Copros become more and more docile and useful.
6. Bibliography
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McCulloch F. (2012) ‘Around We Go’: Transpositional Life Cycles in David Mitchell’s  Cloud Atlas. In: Cosmopolitanism in Contemporary British Fiction. Palgrave  Macmillan, London
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