Only one of these can work: 
print $handles{foo};

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print $strings{foo};

[download]

The latter was picked to work. As such, 

print $x{y} "Wow!\n";

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is as much an error as 
$s = $x{y} "Wow!\n";

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If the file handle expression is non-trivial, you can't omit the curlies around the expression. 

print $fh "...";
print { $fh } "...";
print { $handles{foo} } "...";

print( $fh "..." );
print( { $fh } "..." );
print( { $handles{foo} } "..." );

[download]

print

In reply to Re: Nonsense error from Perl by ikegami
in thread Nonsense error from Perl by Anonymous Monk

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