Active Reading Chapter 12

Aureliano Triste returns with inventions from the outside world. Bruno Crespi, the merchant, is making a fortune off the new inventions. Meanwhile, the ghost of JAB has appeared by the chestnut tree, he seems confused and wanders around the house at noon. Mr. Herbert arrives at the town and eats at the family's house. He usually ate a large amount of bananas. Mr. Brown arrives a little later, he and some other men go exploring where Mr. Hebert usually caught butterflies. The find a huge crop of bananas during their exploration. They start a plantation on land where the old ship was. The train is a curse and a blessing, more people and new inventions are coming to Macondo but so are the whores and criminals of other towns.

Remedios is the only person unconcerned with the problems caused by the train. She lives her life, ignorant of what goes on around her. She does, however, grow tired of the attention she receives form the other men and women of the town. She cuts all her hair off so people will leave her alone, but people find her even more beautiful than before! Many men die for her beauty, some commit suicide or are just killed by their vain attempts to possess her beauty. Remedios is still unaffected by what is going on around her, some of the townspeople believe she emits a poisonous odor. Ursula goes to the extent of hiding Remedios from the public, however she does this in vain because Remedios soon became "lost forever with her in the upper atmosphere where not even the highest-flying birds of memory could reach her."

Colonel Aureliano has become fed up with the white men, Mr. Brown and Mr. Herbert, who run the banana plantation. The Colonel's angry is caused by the killing of boy who spilled his drink on the security guard of the plantation. The Colonel sends his sons to take down the plantation, but are all killed except for one, Aureliano Amador, who flees to the hills. Colonel Aureliano received a condolence from the Republic's President, but responded with angry letters to him.
Colonel Aureliano "as had happened with the death of his wife, as had happened to him so many times during the war with the deaths of his best friends, he did not have a feeling of sorrow but a blind and directionless rage, a broad feeling of impotence." His angry forced him to stop making his fish and his appearance became very haggard. He was not a very happy camper.

Magical Realism: Remedios flying away, she flew to her freedom from the foreigners who lusted after her every hour of the day.

Theme: This chapter seems to focus on the problem with expansion and communication. When Macondo expanded and started finding new ways to communicate with outside world, they were introduced to the world's problems. They can no longer live in blissful solitude.

Character Development: The Colonel is acting like is father when the republic first entered the village. The Whites have become sort of the new antagonist. Remedios flew away. Ursule has to be like 200 now.

Quotes: "It was as if God had decided to put to the test every capacity for surprise and was keeping the inhabitants of Macondo in a permanent alternation between excitement and disappointment, doubt and revelation, to such an extreme that no one knew for certain where the limits of reality lay." Narration of the good and the bad with the modernization of the town.

"Just because we invited a gringo to eat some bananas." The Colonel regretting allowing the whites to live in the village.