"One of them, who called herself Madagascar Rose, was as pretty a girl as he had ever seen, with flowers behind her ears and painted red lips: dearly he would have loved, after ten months on a ship, to be dragged behind her door, to stick his nose between her jasmined breasts and to run his tongue over her vanilla lips- but suddenly there was Serang Ali, in his sarong, blocking the lane, his thin acquiline face compressed into a dagger of disapproval. At the sight of him, the Rose of Madagascar wilted and was gone" (Ghosh, 22).
This passage was particularly striking to me as one of the most vivid, which is strange since there is no dialogue. Ghosh is brilliant in his use of creating visceral imagery that do appear to have symbolic significance. There are also many moments that are laden with animism- similar to Roy. One passage that does this is the scene wherein Serang Ali spits beetle (another motif that seems to represent masculine virility) into the ocean and sharks begin to thrash below thinking it is blood. The scene- coupled with Ghosh's laconic musings from the perspective of Zachary- is extremely evocative and is virtually alive, which, in fact, Ghosh writes.
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