How do I get properly escaped XML in python etree untouched?

Question

I\'m using python version 2.7.3.

test.txt:

    The tag &am         


        

Answer 1

import xml.etree.ElementTree as ET
e = ET.parse('test.txt')
root = e.getroot()
print(ET.tostring(root.find('test')))

yields

<test>The tag &lt;StackOverflow&gt; is good to bring up at parties.</test>

Alternatively, you could escape the text with saxutils.escape:

import xml.sax.saxutils as saxutils
print(saxutils.escape(root.find('test').text))

yields

The tag <StackOverflow> is good to bring up at parties.