my $book = "Not sure 'cause that's 'bout words also including ...\n.\n_\n\n..."; my @fragments; my $last_was_symbol; for (split /\b{wb}/, $book) { if (/[\w\n]/) { $last_was_symbol = 0; push @fragments, $_; } else { if ($last_was_symbol) { $fragments[-1] .= $_; } else { push @fragments, $_; $last_was_symbol = 1; } } } sub show { my $str = shift; $str =~ tr/\n/$/; $str =~ tr/ /_/; print "{$str} "; } show $_ for @fragments; print "\n";