# Escape sequences: special characters inside text

[Concepts explained](README.md)

An **escape sequence** lets you write a character that would otherwise be hard to include in quoted text. In Pliro, it starts with a backslash: `\`. The following character tells Pliro what to put into the text value.

## Why quotes need help

Quotes normally mark where text begins and ends. To include a quote in the message itself, use `\"`:

```pliro
# language: en
say "The turtle says: \"Hello!\""
say "First\nSecond"
say "A backslash: \\"
```

The first instruction prints the quotes around `Hello!`. The second prints two lines. The last prints one backslash.

| Write in the source | Character in the value |
| --- | --- |
| `\"` | A double quote |
| `\\` | A backslash |
| `\n` | A newline |
| `\r` | A carriage return |
| `\t` | A tab |

These are Pliro's supported escapes. An unknown sequence, such as backslash followed by `q`, produces an error. To include an emoji, type or paste the emoji directly; Pliro does not support `\u` escapes.

## Source length and text length

`"\n"` contains two source characters between its quotes, but creates one code point in the text value. `"\\n"` instead creates a backslash followed by the letter `n`.

Predict `length("\n")` and `length("\\n")`. The answers are one and two.

[Text literals](../syntax/text.md) · [Line endings](line-endings.md)