>perl -wMstrict -MData::Dump=dump -le "my \@arr = [ 1, 2, 3, [ 'anna', 'beth', 'christie', 'denise' ], ]; dump @arr; " syntax error at -e line 1, near "my \" Global symbol "@arr" requires explicit package name at -e line 1. Global symbol "@arr" requires explicit package name at -e line 1. Execution of -e aborted due to compilation errors. >perl -wMstrict -MData::Dump=dump -le "my @arr; \@arr = [ 1, 2, 3, [ 'anna', 'beth', 'christie', 'denise' ], ]; dump @arr; " Can't modify reference constructor in scalar assignment ... near "];" Execution of -e aborted due to compilation errors. >perl -wMstrict -MData::Dump=dump -le "my @arr = [ 1, 2, 3, [ 'anna', 'beth', 'christie', 'denise' ], ]; dump @arr; print scalar @arr; " [1, 2, 3, ["anna", "beth", "christie", "denise"]] 1 >perl -wMstrict -MData::Dump=dump -le "my @arr = ( 1, 2, 3, [ 'anna', 'beth', 'christie', 'denise' ], ); dump @arr; print scalar @arr; " (1, 2, 3, ["anna", "beth", "christie", "denise"]) 4