mires in prison, but it is the friendship of Red that he values ??most. After thirty long years behind bars, Andy Durfresne makes use of his superior intelligence ... of the inmates inside Shawshank prison is locked up metaphorically as well as literally, hiding from himself or unable to function in the unregulated world that extends beyond the prison walls. There are many levels of isolation inside Shawshank from the large enclosed recreation yard to the smaller work crews down to the cellblock, cells and finally solitary confinement. The prison is thus a multilayered world, a microcosm of the world outside that the prisoners have been forcibly removed from. The bars, strict schedules sadistic keepers and predatory sisters only add a sense of entrapment and suffocation to these layers of isolation. s confines however, also highlight the extent to which the prisoners have isolated themselves and compromised their sense of identity. Beneath the hardened criminals lie insecure, maladjusted outcasts, many of whom believe they cant function outside the prison system. Elwood Blatch for example ia braggart and an egomaniac whose exaggerated accounts of his exploits fool none of his listeners into believing that he is the master criminal whom he makes himself out to be. Red, meanwhile, identifies Andy as the idea of ??freedom. Freedom is a frightening concept for Red, who dreams of being paroled but eventually struggles to find his place in society after almost forty years in prison. Recounting Andy s escape, therefore, allows Red to face his fears and find the psychological freedom., More than anything else, drives the inmates at Shawshank and gives them the will to live. Andy s sheer determination to maintain his own sense of self-worth and escape keeps him from dying of frustration and anger in solitary confinement. Hope is an abstract, passive emotion, akin to the passive, immobile and inert lives of the prisoners. Andy sets about making hope a reality in the form of the agonizing progress he makes each year tunneling his way through his concrete cell wall. Even Andy s even-keeled and well-balanced temperament, however, eventually succumb to the bleakness of prison life.notes that Tommy William s revelation that he could prove Andy s innocence was like a key unlocking a released a tiger called Hope. This hope reinvigorates Andy and spreads too many of the other inmates in the prison. In his letter addressed to Red, Andy writes that hope is a good thing, which in the end is all that Red has left. Red s decision to go to Mexico to find Andy is the ultimate proof of Red s own redemption, not from his life as a criminal but from his compromised state, bereft of hope and with no reason to embrace life or the future. Red s closing words, as he embarks tentatively onto a new path; show that hope is a difficult concept to sustain both inside the prison and out.blurs the line between right and wrong and challenges the notion that isolating and reforming criminals will turn them into law abiding citizens. Instead, the prison is a den of corruption, greed, bribery and money laundering. Everyone exploits the system for their own gain, from Red, who can smuggle anything into the prison, all the way up to the wardens, who profit from forced prison labor. Andy s willingness to launder Warden Norton s slush money initially serves as a survival technique, a means of protecting himself by extending his good will to the administration. His complicity and knowledge of the warden s illegal enterprises, however, keep Norton from ever releasing him for fear that Andy would reveal the warden s secret. The fact that Shawshank is as corrupt and tainted as the outside world further justifies Andy s escape from a hypocritical, exploitative system that cares little for the prisoners lives or rehabilitation.serves as both a source of torment as well as the backdrop for the slow eventual achievement of Andy s escape, his seemingly impossible goal for nearly twenty eight years. Shawshank redefines the passage of time for the inmates, especially for the lifers like Andy and Red, who can only lokk forward to death. Hours can seem like a lifetime, and every day seems indistinguishable from the next, adding to the loneliness and burden of imprisonment. Ironically, however, time also proves to be the means of Andy s escape and salvation and gives him hope throughout his quarter century in Shawshank. An amateur geologist, Andy realizes that dripping water can be erode stone over the span of several million years and that with his small rock hammer and a lot of patience, he too can break through concrete. His devotion to chipping away at the concrete not only allows him to measure the passage of time but also gives him sense of hope that the other inmates lack.pinup posters of Rita Hayworth and the other women represent the outside world, hope and every inmate s desire to escape to a normal life. Andy admits as much ...
