Note that you get the same error from this code.

# the output from Dumper, s/\$VAR1/\$xml_ref/
$xml_ref ={
          'QuestionList' => [
                              {
                                'Question' => {
                                                'Text' => 'Are dingos 
+your friend?',
                                                'Id' => '3',
                                                'Answer' => 'Satisfact
+ory'
                                              }
                              },
                              {
                                'Question' => {
                                                'Text' => 'Should this
+ run out of memory?',
                                                'Id' => '11',
                                                'Answer' => 'No'
                                              }
                              }
                            ]
        };

print $xml_ref->{'QuestionList'}->{'Question'}->[0]->{'Answer'};
[download]

Note also, as I just have, that what you really want to do is

print $xml_ref->{'QuestionList'}->[0]->{'Question'}->{'Answer'};
[download]

I think that may solve your problem. Why Perl runs out of memory when you give it misleading deep nested references is another matter.

dave hj~