You are allowed this sort of data in tags as long as its marked as CDATA (character data, not to be parsed)

The CDATA tag takes the format <![CDATA...]> where the ... is the text data you dont want to be parsed.

Therefore, your XML should look like:

<main>
    <txt>
        <![CDATA
            this is text. don't forget to look at <a href="http://perl
+monks.org">perlmonks</a>
            don't you just hate <blink>blinking</blink> text?
        ]]>
    </txt>
</main>
[download]

There is another get around: convert all the <'s in the text not to be parsed to &lt; which will look like:

Its not a problem with the parser, more the format of your XML.

<main>
    <txt>
        this is text. don't forget to look at &lt;a href="http://perlm
+onks.org">perlmonks&lt;/a>
        don't you just hate &lt;blink>blinking&lt;/blink> text?
    </txt>
</main>
[download]

This basically stops anything tags being seen by the parser. Not great but it works.

Oh, and if your using the CDATA tags, dont forget to escape anything that may look like the end ]]> in your data.

- Jed