Most programming languages have a syntax for defining multiline string literals. Here’s an example for Ruby: monty = <<END It's only a model. Who's that then? On second thoughts, let's not go there. It is a silly place. END puts monty.inspect #=> "It's only a model.\nWho's that then?\nOn second thoughts, let's not go there.\nIt is a silly place.\n" Javascript, however, does not have such a syntax. You can just insert newline characters yourself (\n), but then you have to escape the actual newline aswell… It’s quite messy!