In an Antique Land: History in the Guise of a Traveler's Tale Book

'In an Antique Land` is a remarkable book. I would say it is one of the best books by Ghosh. It is a story of Ghosh's research that takes him from England to various obscure places in Egypt. So what we see in the book is how he navigates these places, whom he meets, what sort of conversations he has and so forth. As a reader, I feel transplanted in the Egyptian countryside.

This part, which reads like a brilliant travelogue, is highly entertaining as well as informative especially in regard to culture and religion-related (miss)understanding. What kind of stories we tell ourselves about the so-called 'others' and how these stories often have the potential to create and distort us. I guess clever people across cultures and national geographies understand this, they are actually the ones who profit by these conceptions; in fact, they actively create them. It is only the masses who really buy these distortions at face value, and very often get manipulated.

In one of his talks with other young Muslim men, they ask Ghosh a range of questions about India and Hindus. Obviously, these questions are not really questions; their answers are already known to those who pose these questions. They just seek to confirm the stories (prejudices) they have heard about the strange 'others,' In this case, 'the others' are Hindus. One of the Muslim men tell Ghosh that Hindus are very clever people, they burn their dead so that they do not have to face Allah on the day of judgment. In another instance, these men show a great surprise that Hindus do not perform 'Khatna' (circumcision), as the conversation goes in this direction, Ghosh feels a bit embarrassed and wonders where this will lead. These men out of curiosity might ask him to show them his uncircumcised (hindu) penis. There are many such talks in the book which might make the book more palatable and interesting to non-history fans.

The story of his research has two segments that unfold side by side. He goes in search of knowing about an anonymous Indian slave who lived in the 12th century. This is the most fascinating and formidable part of the book. What is so amazing about the book is that it gives interesting, almost unbelievable, glimpses into the deep past, and tells it in a way that history reads seems less dry and distant.

I must add that there are also certain claims, which very often appear fictitious in his novels, but one should check them before dismissing them as fiction (after all who checks facts in fiction). I never found anything in most of his work that is pure fantasy. In this book, however, one can trace the sources and be stunned by them.