The Imam and the Indian - Prose Pieces

by Amitav Ghosh

The Imam and the Indian is an extensive compilation of Amitav Ghosh?31s non-fiction writings. Sporadically published between his novels, in magazines, journals, academic books and periodicals, these essays and articles trace the evolution of the ideas that shape his fiction. He explores the connections between past and present, events and memories, people, cultures and countries that have a shared history. Ghosh combines his historical and anthropological bent of mind with his skills of a novelist, to present a collection like no other.

Genres: Nonfiction, India, Essays, Indian Literature, Literature, Short Stories

380 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2002

About the author

Amitav Ghosh is an Indian writer. He won the 54th Jnanpith award in 2018, India's highest literary honour. Ghosh's ambitious novels use complex narrative strategies to probe the nature of national and personal identity, particularly of the people of India and South Asia. He has written historical fiction and non-fiction works discussing topics such as colonialism and climate change.
Ghosh studied at The Doon School, Dehradun, and earned a doctorate in social anthropology at the University of Oxford. He worked at the Indian Express newspaper in New Delhi and several academic institutions. His first novel, The Circle of Reason, was published in 1986, which he followed with later fictional works, including The Shadow Lines and The Glass Palace. Between 2004 and 2015, he worked on the Ibis trilogy, which revolves around the build-up and implications of the First Opium War. His non-fiction work includes In an Antique Land (1992) and The Great Derangement: Climate Change and the Unthinkable (2016).
Ghosh holds two Lifetime Achievement awards and four honorary doctorates. In 2007, he was awarded the Padma Shri, one of India's highest honours, by the President of India. In 2010, he was a joint winner, along with Margaret Atwood, of a Dan David prize, and in 2011, he was awarded the Grand Prix of the Blue Metropolis festival in Montreal. He was the first English-language writer to receive the award. In 2019, Foreign Policy magazine named him one of the most important global thinkers of the preceding decade.

Reviews

[Blessy Abraham · Rating 5 out of 5]

A wonderful set of essays that cover a diverse set of topics from labor economy of the fellahin in Egypt to the relevance of the novel among the Bengali community. A fascinating plethora of writings that also gives a deeper insight into Amitav Ghosh's views and research work.

[Murali Neelakantan · Rating 2 out of 5]

In some ways, I wish I had read this book before all the others but I am lucky that I did not. It gives one a glimpse of the style of the author that one has come to admire but it also makes for disappointment and frustration. The collection, despite the author's defence in the acknowledgements, could have done with a better editor who should have put his foot down to ensure that the free flowing style that one has come to expect of the author is not interrupted with his academic pieces that do very little for those who adore his novels. If the idea was to show off his early academic work, it does very little to impress and does his credibility no good. The Relations of Envy in an Egyptian Village and Categories of Economy and Orientation of the Fellah Economy do enough to put one off Ghosh altogether in the first few paragraphs. Perhaps he did what he had to do at the time to write them but he did not need to impose his suffering on us. I have admired the manner in which he is able to link his novels. Often, it is more than a few sentences and he is able to make it seem so effortless that one could be forgiven for thinking that it was a manifestation of the subconscious rather than deliberate device. The Imam and the Indian and An Egyptian in Baghdad both form a basis for his novel, In an Antique Land and perhaps one day we will see the fruits of the seed planted as the review of the Baburnama. Right after the interesting historical essay on the life of Bomma and Ben Yiju which seemed like the prototype for another of his novels, is a short but very interesting piece on the Indian diaspora where V.S. Naipaul seems to be the subject. One wonders if Ghosh considers himself a part of the clique of modern Indians writing in English. When he suggests that the English loved Naipaul for his "colonial work" and ignored his finest work, Mr. Stone and the Knight's Companion, one wonders if he is making a case to support all his writing which has exclusively been based on the exotic occidental world. Then all of a sudden one stumbles upon lucid and profound writing that one has come to associate with Ghosh in The Fundamentalist Challenge where he uses Taslima Nasrin's Lojja to showcase the extreme projection of religion as intolerant and suppressive of minorities. The words, "By a curious paradox, the room for dissent has shrunk as the world has grown more free, and today, in this diminished space, every utterance begins to turn on itself", are profound and powerful. One can't understand why it is that the events of 9/11 are now accepted as a watershed in world history and why Ghosh feels compelled to write about it in the same way as the genocide in Sri Lanka or Cambodia. It is difficult to understand how that fits within the theme of the piece "The greatest sorrow: time of joy recalled in wretchedness" and the effort to show empathy seems too contrived to be credible. Ending the book with his tribute to Agha Shahid Ali is difficult to understand and it confirms the impression that one gets that this collection of prose pieces that may politely be described as eclectic. If one were cynical one would have thought that Ghosh was easily induced to believe that all of his work was interesting and fell for banal flattery of his greedy publisher who thought he could get good money for old rope. One can only hope Ghosh does not lose sight of what he does well and thinks of all his past work as no more than experiments from which he has learnt just as one is not required to taste all the ingredients in their various stages of cooking while waiting for the gourmet dish to be served.

[Gita Madhu · Rating 3 out of 5]

The first few (7 or 8) essays seem to have been taken as a whole from his In an Antique Land (1992) or are, in some way or the other, related to it. It might be the same for the other pieces, but, for his fans, an Amitav Ghosh anthology is a collector's item.
I did not get to read all the essays and will re-borrow it as I do want to read the one on Agha Shahid Ali's poetry. Just yesterday I came across a collection of his poems.
Of the ones I read I retain the Ghosts of Mrs Gandhi, a piece on the anti-Sikh riots which followed her assassination and the one about a New York fundraising party for Tibet.
The first of these two holds special significance for me as I lived in Delhi during that terrible time. His descriptions are gently vivid and touching in their delicacy and his self-analysis and pondering on writers and riots.
In the second, he bonds, in a way, with a Tibetan monk at another table. His tact and diplomacy of pen make it hard to unravel his intents.
It's meant for the more serious reader, fairly free of frills, but that does not mean that the usual reader of fiction won't find it interesting.

[Shanthanu · Rating 4 out of 5]

This collection of essays is quite varied from fairly informal writings to very academic papers submitted to anthropological journals, but they all share his refreshing internationalist perspective. If nothing else, this collection is worth reading simply for its description of the '84 anti Sikh riots (during which Ghosh was in Delhi) and how similar they feel to other essays of his dealing with happenings in Bangladesh, Sri Lanka & Cambodia. He strongly makes the case that these are not isolated problems dealing with religious, linguistic, racial or any such issues, but instead manifestations of the same tendency towards extremist violence. In order to prevent this from happening, we need to better understand the reasons behind this phenomenon.

[Pubali · Rating 3 out of 5]

Great essays of the author's personal experiences. Also contains some book reviews of historical significance. Quite engrossing.

[Ashish · Rating 3 out of 5]

Quite a varied genres of prose by Amitav Ghosh based on some of his experiences and his research. No comment on his world class writing.

[Ramaswamy Raman · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book is a series of essays or writing or thoughts of the Author Amitav Ghosh over ttd years on various topics, places, people etc. The writing is a notch above and not something for normal fiction readers as it thought provoking notes which needs time abd patience.
Story 1: The imam And The Indian
This is a simple humour story eehich happened when the author was in Egypt. Even in this plot as a reader you tend to know a lot about how the Islamic countries look at Indians and their culture.
Story 2: Tibetan Dinner
Thus again is a small story of tge author's integration during a dinner party.
Story 3: Four Corners
This talks about an unusual place in the US where 4 stages meet. What you can see there and howvthis has become quite a tourist spot.
Story 4: An Egyptian in Baghdad
This story is about the bond created between the author and few Egyptians and also covers the dependency of Egyptians on jobs in Iraq.
Story 5: The Ghosts Of Mrs. Gandhi
This story is about the aftermath of Indira Gandhi's assassination wherein Sikhs were killed.
Story 6: The Human Comedy in Cairo
This story is about the Egyptian writer Naguib Mahfouz and his thoughts.
Story 7: Retrofitting: The Oil Encounter And The Novel.
This
This talks of the 5 part cycle of Novels by Abderlrahman Munif dealing with the history of Oil.
Story 8: Empire and Soul: A Review Of The Baburnama.
One of my favorites from this book which talks in detail about the autobiography written by Babur the first Mughal Emperor.
Story 9: The relations of envy in an Egyptian village.
Here the author describes in detail the superstitions and effects of evil eye that is followed in Egyptian villages.
Story 19: Categories of labour and the orientation of the fellah economy.
This is the most tiring chapter to read all thoughts are about the economy and life in Egypt.
Story 11: The slave of MS H.6
This is also a lengthy discussion on the story of the slave.
Story 12: the diaspora in Indian culture
This talks about the Indian diaspora and how the world view is about India
Story 13: the global reservation : notes towards an ethnography of international peacekeeping
This talks about the UN and it's peace keeping activities.
Story 14;the fundamental challenge
This talks about religious or other small incidents and how it effects the people aroubfld forever as small fights grow to major issues snd killings on huge numbers.
Story 15: the March of the novel through history: the testimony of my grandfather's bookcase
Another interest discussion on book collections, reason behind it and what types of collection is being built by people around the globe.
Story 16: the great sorrow: times of joy recalled in wretchedness
This is discussion on the past tragic days which the author has seen and writes about it's effects on his life and also of others.
Story 17: the hunger of stones.
Story translation from o ebof Rabindranath Tagore's stories. Not something enjoyable
Story 28: the ghat of the only world: Agha Shahid Ali
This is a story of the famous poet Shahid and his interaction with the author.

Overall the writing thoughts are well expressed but may not be easy for a lot of youngsters to read as many are essays written as thesis which itself are detailed type documents.
Good literature but may not be everyone’s cup ofvtea.

[Vampire Who Baked · Rating 5 out of 5]

While I suaully try to stay away from reading too many famous "celebrity" writers, this book was an exception-- in no small part because this is a collection of non-fiction essays by Amitav Ghosh, who is known more as a fiction writer than anything else.

Before he became well known in fiction, Ghosh trained as a scholar in anthropology and spent long periods of time living abroad doing research, primarily in a small village in Egypt, but also in Cambodia later on in life. This eclectic collection of essays is a testament to his keen eye in recording both personal accounts as well as anecdotes that provide a broader social commentary about culture and social processes. This is not a dry book-- even the most argumentative, research-y chapters are liberally peppered with humour and a sense of the personal, and wider perspectives about the commonalities that bind people across divisions of time and space.

This is, as I mentioned earlier, an eclectic collection. He devotes a few chapters to Egypt, but the rest of the essays are very diverse in topic and format. In one he gives a disturbing first hand account of the violence and bloodlust during the Sikh riots post Indira Gandhi's assassination. In another he talks about the relevance of the novel in Bengali culture through the years, as evidenced by analysing the tomes in his grandfather's personal library (the books actually belonged to his uncle) which he used to raid during his visits to Calcutta. Yet another chapter is a eulogy to the great Kashmiri poet Agha Shahid Ali-- written as a result of a personal promise to Ali, a close friend of Ghosh, as he was dying of brain cancer far too young. The collection also contains a translation of Tagore's famous (at least in Bengali circles) "Kshudito Pashan", a compilation on notes on the ethnography of the UN peacekeeping forces in Cambodia, an anecdote of a Tibet-relief fundraising dinner that the author attended where he rubbed shoulders with NYC's biggest celebrities, and an astute piece on how the Indian diaspora differs from that of other countries in terms of their relation with their ancestral homeland.

The book was an extremely enjoyable read throughout-- and as happens with anthologies, I had the luxury to pick and choose what I wanted to read, and when, and how. Highly recommend to everyone, but in particular to folks who have either never come across Amitav Ghosh, or only know him as a fiction writer.

[Revanth Ukkalam · Rating 4 out of 5]

The essayist in Amitav Ghosh deserves more praise and attention. I believe that his 'Dancing in Cambodia' is an excellent window into South East Asian politics and history. Unlike 'Dancing' and 'The Great Derangement', this book is far more wide-ranging. It allows one to truly have a glimpse of the span of the man and his intellectual preoccupations. The essays in this book comment upon general subjects like politics, diplomacy, and social change (in the essays on Anti-Sikh riots, Sri Lankan civil war, and UNO peace missions). His forte however is the Arab world which he intuitively and intimately knows. His encounters with the Imam of course, but poets, and the usual fellaheen are a delight to read. It is in this vista that one first faces Ghosh's interest in the Geniza records (elaborated in 'In an Antique land'). But Ghosh must be read for his book reviews. I am grateful to him for introducing me to Abdelrahman Munif an author who wrote novels with the Oil Encounter as the backdrop and writing an excellent review of Naguib Mahfouz. And what more, there is also a review of the Babur Nama in this slim book.

[Kitty Russell · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5, took over my life for a while. Once you're in, you're onboard and it won't let you go. I think the last in the trilogy is the weakest, and the lack of conclusions for some characters leaves me wanting.

[Sreevas Munnoolam · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting pieces stories from an author who have everything for writing.

[Elzira Rai · Rating 4 out of 5]

The centerpiece of this eclectic collection, The Slave of Ms. H.6 (also published in one of the Subaltern Studies volumes), is a fascinating if bizarre exercise in historiographic and ethnographic speculation: Ghosh builds an entire narrative from the flimsiest pieces of evidence, and somehow gets away with it. I suspect that by this point his fiction-writing Hyde was beginning to subdue the academic Jekyll, and that he wasn't too comfortable with the distinctly British dryness of his quasi-functionalist ethnographic essays on Egypt. The pieces on the Baburnama and the anti-Sikh riots following Indira Gandhi's murder also stand out, despite Ghosh's sometimes excessively baroque prose. Other essays, such as the one on UN peacekeeping missions and 'fundamentalism' offer little more than examples of the postmodern literary fascination with terror and violence, albeit cloaked in the guise of humanism.

[Vidya · Rating 4 out of 5]

This collection puts Amitav as a writer in a different league. He has a rich vocabulary not only of words but of experiences and of observations, that his narration is very informative and diverse.