title: Python escape special characters in sys argv
body: <p>I have a script that takes sys.argv and the input may contain special characters (semicolon). I just need the input as string, but semicolon messes everything up..</p>
  
  <p>I have:</p>
  
  <pre><code>def myscript(text)
      print text
  
  
  a = myscript(sys.argv[1])
  print a
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>I try:</p>
  
  <pre><code>&gt;&gt;  python script.py "With these words she greeted Prince Vasili Kuragin, a man of high rank and importance, who was the first to arrive at her reception. Anna Pavlovna had had a cough for some days. She was, as she said, suffering" from la grippe; grippe being then a new word in St. Petersburg""
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>I get:</p>
  
  <pre><code>'With these words she greeted Prince Vasili Kuragin, a man of high rank and importance, who was the first to arrive at her reception. Anna Pavlovna had had a cough for some days. She was, as she said, suffering'
  None
  bash: grippe: command not found
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>I just want to get the whole string into the script no matter what is inside it..</p>
  
  <p>I tried:</p>
  
  <pre><code>a = myscript(repr(sys.argv[1]))
  a = myscript(str(sys.argv[1]))
  </code></pre>