Here's the simplest way to explain this. Here's what I'm using: re.split('\W', 'foo/bar spam\neggs') >>> ['foo', 'bar', 'spam', 'eggs'] Here's what I want: someMethod('\W', 'foo/bar spam\neggs') >>> ['foo', '/', 'bar', ' ', 'spam', '\n', 'eggs'] The reason is that I want to split a string into tokens, manipulate it, then put it back together again. Continue reading...