The book “In an Antique Land” (1922) deals with the post-colonial narratives which Ghosh tries to highlight about the issues concerning the post-colonial society of India as well as the postcolonial narrative of imperial power. The book accounts the coming of the Europeans to the Indian society and he also traces the concept of slavery in detailed account which the concept of slavery was changed by the Europeans.
Firstly, the postcolonial narrative of Egypt is seen in the book. The narrative of the European construct about the Egypt , Cairo which they perceived it from the context of the Bible. Ghosh states that the Europeans “has always insisted on knowing the country,not on its own terms, but as a dark mirror for itself.” The dictionary suggested that they constructed it as “Egyptian darkness” and from the Bible as “intense darkness”. Said has also argued that the East has helped to define the West and the western constructs about the Egypt has established the European country in opposition to their constructs to be of light or civilized nation.
The post-colonial elements include the exploration of exile and the coming of immigrants, communalism and riots. India as a country suffered from these products as a result of British imperial policies. He states in his book that he lived in Dhaka which he calls it as “our ancestral city”. After the partition, their ancestors moved “westwards” and “Dhaka was foreign territory to us” which shows the feeling of exile. The home becomes a foreign nation and they become a merely refugee residing in the “westwards”. They became exiled and settled in the “new residential suburb on the outskirts of the city”. The immigrants or the displacement of the people is the portrayal of post-colonial literature. Ghosh stated their garden was filled with large number of men and women and “children sitting on the grass”. Ghosh noted that “No one ever explained to me what those groups of people were doing in our house and I was too young to work out for myself that they were refugees, fleeing from mobs”. The lines clearly indicates the aftermath of partition and the violence that followed with the mobs.
Ghosh highlighted the post-colonial element of communalism and riots after partition in India. He was a small child when he observed all the effects of communalism and riots taking place in the place residing them. He saw flames outside his house and he”discovered that on the very night when I’d seen those flames dancing around the walls of our house, there has been a riot in calcutta too, similar in every respect except that there it was Muslims who had been attacked by Hindus”. Ghosh also notes that the riots were always filled with the same stories.He states the cities were filled with flames or fire and cows were dead found in the temple or a pig was found dead in a mosque which is a culminating trigger for the communalism. He even stated that people were killed for wearing a lungi or a dhoti or “women disembowelled for wearing veils or vermillion, of men dismembered for the state of their foreskins”.
Ghosh also gives a detailed account of the imperial power and policy on India. When the Portuguese landed on Calicut, Mangalore in the year 17th May 1498 by Vasco da Gama, he was thrilled with the trade market of Mangalore. He proposed his policy to the King of Mangalore who was Samudri and he refused to accept the policy. Vasco da Gama wanted to expel “all Muslims from his kingdom as they were enemies of the Holy Faith”. He even stated the imperial violence where the “Europeans were bent on taking control of it by aggression, pure and distilled, by unleashing violence on a scale unprecedented on those shores”. This lines clearly shows the imperial policy and violence against the Indians. Their policy changed the relationship between India and Middle East and the post-colonial overview still suggests in the book that the imperial power was able to bring division between the Middle East and India.
