A couple of recently published books will give you a feel for how far Perl has come in the past nine years:

• Modern Perl by chromatic. Also available as a free download. See also modern perl blog.
• Effective Perl Programming by brian d foy, Joshua McAdams and Joseph N Hall.

The web sites associated with these two books are also worth browsing.

Update: Also note that the classic Programming Perl is finally being updated in a new fourth edition, due in December.