In an Antique Land - Softcover

Amitav-ghosh

3.85

3,298 ratings by Goodreads

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1862071209 ISBN 13: 9781862071209

Publisher: Granta Books, 1998

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In the 1980s amitav ghosh moved into a converted chicken coop it was on the roof of a house in lataifa, a tiny village in egypt during the day he poured over medieval letters sent to india from cairo by arab merchants in the evenings he shut out the bellowing of his fat landlord by turning up the volume of his transistor radio and wrote stories based on what he had seen in the village the story of khamees the rat, the notorious impotent (already twice married); of zaghloul the weaver determined to travel to india on a donkey; of one-eyed mohammad, so obsessed with a girl that he spent nights kneeling outside her window to listen to the sound of her breathing; of amm taha, part-time witch, always ready to cast a spell for a little extra money; and, of course, the story of amitav ghosh himself, known in the village as the indian doctor, the uncircumcised, cow-worshipping kaffir who would not convert to islam this book is the story of amitav ghoshs decade of intimacy with the village community mixing conversation and research, imagination and scholarship, it is also a charged, eccentric history of the special relationship between two countires, egypt and india, through nearly ten centuries of parochialism and sympathy, bigotry and affection

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About the Author:

Amitav Ghosh is the internationally bestselling author of many works of fiction and non-fiction, including the novel The Glass Palace, and the recipient of numerous prizes and awards. He divides his time between Kolkata and Goa, India, and Brooklyn, New York.

From Kirkus Reviews:

An engrossing chronicle of historical detection smoothly integrated into a subtly shaped picture of village life in modern Egypt; by an Indian novelist (The Circle of Reason, 1986) of great sensitivity and power. Enrolled as a cultural-anthropology graduate student at the University of Alexandria, Ghosh settled in 1980 into the Egyptian farming village of Lataifa. Two years earlier, he had become interested in ancient manuscripts found in a storeroom of a tenth- century Cairo synagogue; included in the cache were letters from a Jewish trader, who mentioned his Indian slave. Intrigued, Ghosh pursued the identity of his 12th-century countryman. The author's findings about the daily activities of slave and master make fascinating reading (e.g., that the slave represented his master in financial dealings), and alternating with this historical data are chapters detailing Ghosh's gradual assimilation into the life of Lataifa. His affectionate portraits of the villagers and of their often colorful idiosyncracies (for example, the complicated relationship between the Imam and his estranged first wife) attest to his perceptivity as a sympathetic observer of a rapidly changing society. In a particularly effective passage, he recounts his feelings when, after persistent questioning about his Hindu beliefs, he discovered in himself what he calls ``Indians' terror of symbols.'' And Ghosh is equally astute in detailing the changes wrought by young villagers' departures for jobs in wartime Iraq. While new homes, refrigerators, TVs, and electric generators proliferate, he says, the weakening of family and civic ties proves a high price to pay. Throughout, Ghosh writes with enormous lucidity and flashes of gentle humor, conveying in small and telling details the underlying suspiciousness and insecurity that pervade Egyptian society. Moving in its humanity, revealing in its analyses: an exceptionally satisfying work. -- Copyright �1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

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