diff --git a/Doc/reference/lexical_analysis.rst b/Doc/reference/lexical_analysis.rst index 17c0fb4a51eb4fb8e1926e17f95c08fcf544e442..b8f9ca21c06825270e51eac79eb26cd7bc09186e 100644 --- a/Doc/reference/lexical_analysis.rst +++ b/Doc/reference/lexical_analysis.rst @@ -447,9 +447,11 @@ see section :ref:`encodings`. In plain English: Both types of literals can be enclosed in matching single quotes (``'``) or double quotes (``"``). They can also be enclosed in matching groups of three single or double quotes (these are generally referred to as -*triple-quoted strings*). The backslash (``\``) character is used to escape -characters that otherwise have a special meaning, such as newline, backslash -itself, or the quote character. +*triple-quoted strings*). The backslash (``\``) character is used to give special +meaning to otherwise ordinary characters like ``n``, which means 'newline' when +escaped (``\n``). It can also be used to escape characters that otherwise have a +special meaning, such as newline, backslash itself, or the quote character. +See :ref:`escape sequences <escape-sequences>` below for examples. .. index:: single: b'; bytes literal @@ -508,6 +510,8 @@ retained), except that three unescaped quotes in a row terminate the literal. ( single: \u; escape sequence single: \U; escape sequence +.. _escape-sequences: + Unless an ``'r'`` or ``'R'`` prefix is present, escape sequences in string and bytes literals are interpreted according to rules similar to those used by Standard C. The recognized escape sequences are: