A Scientific Fantasy: Amitav Ghosh’s The Calcutta Chromosome

Abstract

This paper discusses The Calcutta Chromosome by Amitav Ghosh as a work of scientific fantasy. The narrative follows several personalities and jumps around in time, all of which are expertly woven together. Antar, an Egyptian clerk in New York City (NYC), encounters a misplaced ID card in the book. Antar met a weird man named Murugan a long time ago, and he owns it. He is the man renowned to be the foremost expert about Ronald Ross, who was responsible for the 1898 Malaria mystery in Calcutta. As Antar investigates the man's true fate, a tangled web develops, and by the time Antar becomes embroiled in it, already too late to escape. With multiple storylines from various eras, the book has multiple layers. Naturally, the goal is for them to eventually blend together nicely.