use Regexp::SlashN; "A B C" =~ /(\N+)/; $1 eq "A B C" or die; #### package Regexp::SlashN; use overload; sub import { overload::constant qr => \ &convert } # A simple table of definitions my %syntax = ( '\\' => '\\', N => '[^\n]', ); sub convert { my ( $re ) = @_; $re =~ s/\\([\\N])/$syntax{$1}/g; return $re; }