I don't think there's a way to avoid recursing to make the copy. Assuming the referenced data structure has refs within refs anyway.

Might I suggest Storable's freeze/thaw combo: dclone()? It handle's most of the surprises automatically.

Say you have $ar = [ 1,2,3 ];. You can in fact copy it with $b = [ @$ar ]. It doesn't work quite right with $ar = [ [ 1,2,3 ] ] however, as you'll end up with a copy of the ref in a new array ref, if you follow my meaning.