perldoc perlop

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The terminating string may be either an identifier (a word), or some quoted text. An unquoted identifier works like double quotes. There may not be a space between the << and the identifier, unless the identifier is explicitly quoted. (If you put a space it will be treated as a null identifier, which is valid, and matches the first empty line.) The terminating string must appear by itself (unquoted and with no surrounding whitespace) on the terminating line.
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