In the novel, Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption, Steven King depicts a man, Andy Defresne, who had been sentenced to a life in prison. However, Andy manages to escape the prison through a waste pipe he accessed through a hole in his cell wall. After, he escapes the prison staff goes on a mass panic and the reader’s only information is provided by Red, the narrator and an inmate. King utilizes the element of storytelling through Red’s narration regarding Andy’s escape in order to characterize Andy as courageous. King uses Red’s imagination in his narration to indicate the boldness of Andy’s escape. After Andy’s escape route is discovered, a prison guard, Rory Tremont, is ordered to follow his path. Red, the narrator, states, “I guess that Rory Tremont decided he didn’t have much to lose after he’d lost his lunch and dinner, because he did go on.” Red’s assumption that Rory “didn’t have much to lose” in order to enter the pipe, characterizes Andy’s motivation the same way. Rory had to vomit and lose his food in order come close to Andy’s courage to enter the pipe. However, Andy had lost more than his food, he lost just about everything including his freedom. So, Andy “didn’t have much to lose” and had so much…show more content… Red consistently uses storytelling in his narration to influence the reader. He does so by not providing the exact truth of Andy’s escape, which creates possibly false ideas to accompany the escape. However, the reader is unable to know exactly what happened to Andy during his time in the sewage pipe because Red is the only narrator. So, Red is the reader’s only source of information causing them to have to trust his storytelling and Andy’s assumed courage. Also, Andy is described as appearing weak throughout the novel, but King uses Red’s storytelling to display that Andy’s character is stronger and bolder than his
