Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption Freedom and Confinement Quotes

How we cite our quotes: (Paragraph)

Quote #7

"'I like you right where you are, Mr. Dufresne, and as long as I am warden here at Shawshank, you are going to be right here.'" (309)

Warden Norton is reminding Andy's of how powerless he is in prison. It really doesn't matter to him whether Andy's innocent or not. Norton doesn't like him, so he's going to keep his mouth shut. Period. Confinement seems to come at the whims of colossal jerk.

Quote #8

"'I couldn't do it,' I said. 'I couldn't get along on the outside. I'm what they call an institutional man now." (371)

Red is "institutionalized," meaning he can't survive on the outside world. Prison, it seems is more than a place—it's a state of mind. Of course, if that's true, then you can overcome it with the power of positive thinking like Andy does.

Quote #9

"He'd had the key under the rock in Buxton to worry about for years. Now he had to worry that some eager-beaver new guard would look behind his poster and expose the whole thing." (488)

Andy has to worry a lot about things he can't do anything about. That's as apt a description of confinement as you can find. Even those of us on the outside have to worry about stuff that's out of our control a lot. It's almost as if King wants us to remember the whole "prison in your mind" stuff and how it might apply to us…