#!/usr/bin/perl -w use strict; use Data::Dumper; $Data::Dumper::Useqq = 1; my $abc=['cde','bdef','dummy', " \n"]; print (Data::Dumper->Dump($abc) . "\n"); #this will work fine print (Dumper($abc) . "\n"); #this will work fine print (Data::Dumper->Dump(@$abc) . "\n"); # this will give usage error as I mentioned earlier. 1; #### Output: $VAR1 = "cde"; $VAR2 = "bdef"; $VAR3 = "dummy"; $VAR4 = " \n"; $VAR1 = [ "cde", "bdef", "dummy", " \n" ]; Usage: PACKAGE->new(ARRAYREF, [ARRAYREF]) at /tmp/ab123.pl line 8