Past as prophecy

In Ghost-Eye, Amitav Ghosh links memory, myth and modern ecological crisis

- BY SHUBHANGI SHAH

GHOST-EYE by Amitav Ghosh Published by Fourth Estate India Pages 336; price ₹799

Even after the last page of Ghost-Eye, Amitav Ghosh's latest novel, the spell lingers. The magical realism of his world is slow to loosen its grip; the real world seems subtly altered. The book sharpens one's attentiveness—even the sound of leaves rustling assumes new significance. This enduring effect is a testament to Ghosh's formidable narrative control.

And yet, the novel falters at the end.

More on that later. Let us begin at the beginning.

The novel opens in 1969 Calcutta, in a wealthy Marwari household. A commotion breaks out at the Gupta mansion when Varsha, the three-year-old daughter of the family's business scion, declares that she wants to have fish—an insistence that is deeply unsettling in a strictly vegetarian family. Then she goes further. Looking at her mother, she says: “That is not my mother. My real mother... doesn't live here. Our home is beside a river.”