title: Why are three apostrophes needed for print in Python?
body: <p>I'm making this Pythagoras Theorem Calculator in Python 3.3.2.</p>
  
  <p>I made print over several lines so that I could make a diagram:</p>
  
  <pre><code>print("Welcome to the Pythagoras Theorem Calculator, powered by Python!")
  print("Below are the values a, b and c. You will need to input these values after.")
  print('''
        | .
        |   .
        |     .
  side a|       . side c
        |         .
        |           .
        |_____________.
            side b
        ''')
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>As you can see above, three apostrophes were needed instead of the speech marks. Why is this so? Is it an escape character? (I've tried searching on Google: <a href="http://bit.ly/15a4zes" rel="noreferrer">http://bit.ly/15a4zes</a>)</p>