qwurx [shmem] ~ > perl -MO=Deparse -le 'my My $my = "my"' No such class My at -e line 1, near "my My" -e had compilation errors. BEGIN { $/ = "\n"; $\ = "\n"; } $my = 'my'; #### qwurx [shmem] ~ > perl -MO=Deparse -le 'package My; package main; my My $my = "my"' BEGIN { $/ = "\n"; $\ = "\n"; } my $my = 'my'; -e syntax OK