diff -r af0dcd9df0c0 Lib/test/test_re.py
--- a/Lib/test/test_re.py	Sat Mar 12 11:18:46 2011 +0000
+++ b/Lib/test/test_re.py	Sun Mar 13 02:58:05 2011 +0000
@@ -412,30 +412,31 @@
         self.assertEqual(re.search("a\s", "a ").group(0), "a ")
 
     def test_re_escape(self):
-        p=""
-        self.assertEqual(re.escape(p), p)
-        for i in range(0, 256):
-            p = p + chr(i)
-            self.assertEqual(re.match(re.escape(chr(i)), chr(i)) is not None,
-                             True)
-            self.assertEqual(re.match(re.escape(chr(i)), chr(i)).span(), (0,1))
-
-        pat=re.compile(re.escape(p))
-        self.assertEqual(pat.match(p) is not None, True)
-        self.assertEqual(pat.match(p).span(), (0,256))
+        for c in {'\0', '_', '!', '\t', ''}:
+            self.assertEqual(re.escape(c), c)
+        p = ''.join(chr(i) for i in range(256))
+        for c in p:
+            m = re.match(re.escape(c), c)
+            self.assertTrue(m)
+            self.assertEqual(m.span(), (0, 1))
+        
+        match = re.match(re.escape(p), p)
+        self.assertTrue(match)
+        self.assertEqual(match.span(), (0, 256))
 
     def test_re_escape_byte(self):
-        p=b""
-        self.assertEqual(re.escape(p), p)
-        for i in range(0, 256):
+        for b in {b'\0', b'_', b'!', b'\t', b''}:
+            self.assertEqual(re.escape(b), b)
+        for i in range(256):
             b = bytes([i])
-            p += b
-            self.assertEqual(re.match(re.escape(b), b) is not None, True)
-            self.assertEqual(re.match(re.escape(b), b).span(), (0,1))
+            m = re.match(re.escape(b), b)
+            self.assertTrue(m)
+            self.assertEqual(m.span(), (0, 1))
 
-        pat=re.compile(re.escape(p))
-        self.assertEqual(pat.match(p) is not None, True)
-        self.assertEqual(pat.match(p).span(), (0,256))
+        p = bytes(range(256))
+        match = re.match(re.escape(p), p)
+        self.assertTrue(match)
+        self.assertEqual(match.span(), (0, 256))
 
     def pickle_test(self, pickle):
         oldpat = re.compile('a(?:b|(c|e){1,2}?|d)+?(.)')