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Absolutely. In fact, I shall look up a few more that I have highlighted (because the sign of a loved book is one that has all my annotations and underlinings all over it)

For one thing, Frobisher is quite openly bisexual, as he speaks multiple times of encounters with men and women. Sixsmith is, to me, quite clearly coded as a gay character: Frobisher says to him  ’you should try ‘em yourself one time, a woman I mean’ (pg 69), suggesting that Sixsmith doesn’t normally swing towards women. So, right there, we have them both coded as queer characters and therefore the idea of them being romantically and sexually linked is not a far-fetched idea.

We also have Frobisher telling Sixsmith that ‘you should try to enjoy love-making in total silence. All that ballyhooing transmutes to pure bliss if you’ll only seal your lips’ (also pg 69). To me, this quite clearly indicates that Frobisher has an intimate knowledge of just how loud Sixsmith is in bed. In fact, I wrote a piece of fanfiction inspired by these lines. 

When Frobisher recounts to Sixsmith that he is falling in love with Eva, he writes ‘don’t be hatefully jealous, Sixsmith. You know how it is’ (pg 470) Why would Sixsmith be jealous? Perhaps he fears losing Frobisher’s friendship if Frobisher were to be with someone romantically, but then what could Frobisher’s assertion that ‘you know how it is’ be about? To me, the line translates purely as meaning that Frobisher and Sixsmith are lovers and yet they cannot be together because of the time in which they live. Indeed, Frobisher asserts that the reason he is falling for Eva is because she ‘explores me unhurriedly, like you did’ (pg 472) and because she’s ‘lean as a boy’. Not only does this indicate Frobisher’s leaning towards women and men, but he states that he is falling for Eva because she is like Sixsmith or at least because he believes she treats him as Sixsmith has treated him. Yes, he is falling for Eva, but if exactly the same things that he’s falling for in Eva he sees in Sixsmith as well, that suggests to me that of course he and Sixsmith were/are lovers. On a purely physical level, the idea of ‘exploring unhurriedly’ carries a sexual tone to it as well.

We of course have the lines where both of them actively use the word ‘love’ - ’‘You groan and shake your head, Sixsmith, I know, but you smile too, which is why I love you’ (pg 45) and then ‘He (Sixsmith) witnesses himself through Robert’s words, searching Bruges for his unstable friend, first love and if I’m honest, my last’ (pg 113). We could argue that they mean a platonic kind of love, but we must remember that these are the thirties, where language like that between two platonic male friends would not have been common (as opposed to, say, the language that may be used between two platonic female friends) and when we combined that with the fact that they are both queer characters, it actually seems like more of a leap to suggest that they are not romantically/sexually involved than to conclude that they are. 

And then of course we have the quotation that you’ve given me (which in my copy is on pg 489 :D ). We could argue then and there that it is music he is talking about, but the fact that it is a shared knowledge between both of them (‘we both know’), and the fact that it is ‘who’ instead of ‘what’ is the love of his life, absolutely suggests that this is one last declaration of love from Frobisher towards Sixsmith as he prepares to kill himself. 

And finally, we have: ‘You and I will sleep under Corsican stars again’. So maybe it’s just the hopeless romantic in me, but this is a very romantic line. Frobisher and Sixsmith have slept together under those Corsican stars. This whole idea is loaded with sexual and romantic connotations, and to me it can only pertain to sleeping with each other in every sense of the word.  

I’d also remind people that David Mitchell did have a little involvement in the adaptation of the book into a film, and if sexual and romantic presentation of the Frobisher/Sixsmith relationship was a massive misreading on behalf of the screenwriters/directors, I am very certain it would have been pointed out. 

The fact is, that the only thing stopping it from being canon is that Frobisher, in his letters, never gives us any concrete exposition as to their relationship…and why would he? It is written in letter form. He’s writing to Sixsmith; he doesn’t need to remind him of the fact that they are lovers. They know. They both know. And, as we must take the time of the events, the thirties, into account, they would have had to have spoken in a kind of code. Why is it that some people take the view that it must be heterosexual or platonic unless explicitly stated otherwise? Some things don’t need saying. Yes, I do believe that they were best friends, the very best of friends, since they were thirteen (‘in thirteen years from now we’ll meet again at Gresham’ pg 490) but I also believe that they were lovers.

I believe that this is canonical fact, and anyone who says otherwise is sadly taking a very heteronormalised reading of what the canon presents us with. 

And, let’s be honest - why wouldn’t you want to ship these two? 

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James D’Arcy

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Cloud Atlas, First and Last Lines

Beyond the Indian hamlet, upon a forlorn strand, I happened on a trail of recent footprints. - The Pacific Journal of Adam Ewing

Sixsmith, Dreamt I stood in a china shop so crowded from floor to far-off ceiling with shelves of porcelain antiquities etc. that moving a muscle would cause several to fall and smash to bits. - Letters from Zedelghem

Rufus Sixsmith leans over the balcony and estimates his body’s velocity when it hits the sidewalk and lays his dilemmas to rest. - Half-Lives: The First Luisa Rey Mystery

One bright dusk, four, five, no, my God, six summers ago, I strolled along a Greenwich avenue of mature chestnuts and mock oranges in a state of grace. - The Ghastly Ordeal of Timothy Cavendish

On behalf of my ministry, thank you for agreeing to this final interview. - An Orison of Sonmi-451

Old Georgie’s path an’ mine crossed more times’n I’m comfy mem’ryin’, an’ after I’m died, no sayin’ what that fangy devil won’t try an’ do to me… so gimme some mutton an’ I’ll tell you ‘bout our first meetin’. - Sloosha’s Crossin’ an’ Ev’rythin’ After

Look. - Sloosha’s Crossin’ an’ Ev’rythin’ After

A certain disney I once began, one nite long ago in another age. - An Orison of Sonmi-451

Like Solzhenitsyn, I shall return, one bright dusk. - The Ghastly Ordeal of Timothy Cavendish

Who is to say? - Half-Lives: The First Luisa Rey Mystery

Sunt lacrimae rerum. - Letters from Zedelghem

Yet what is any ocean but a multitude of drops? - The Pacific Journal of Adam Ewing

  Goodbye and thanks for all the mind fucks!

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Letters from Zedelghem [13/18]

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I believe death is only a door, when it closes, another opens. If I care to imagine heaven. I would imagine a door opening. And behind it, I would find him there, waiting for me.

Cloud Atlas

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[[*whispers* I haven't forgotten you all...]]

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I’m currently watching Cloud Atlas… very cool so far. 

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"And all becomes clear. Wish I could make you see this brightness. Don’t worry, all is well. All is so perfectly, damnably well. I understand now, that boundaries between noise and sound are conventions. All boundaries are conventions, waiting to be transcended. One may transcend any convention, if only one can first conceive of doing so. Moments like this, I can feel your heart beating as clearly as I feel my own, and I know that separation is an illusion. My life extends far beyond the limitations of me."

Robert Frobisher, from the movie Cloud Atlas

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"A half-read book is a half-finished love affair."

              — Robert Frobisher (David Mitchell, Cloud Atlas)

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People who are still saying Cloud Atlas the movie was racist and yellowfaced people still don’t understand the movie and probably never will bye

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I believe we do not stay dead long. Find me beneath the Corsican stars where we first kissed.

Yours eternally, R.F.

                                 -David Mitchell, Cloud Atlas

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History admits no rules; only outcomes.

Cloud Atlas, David Mitchell