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I think there are several problems here.
I was able to narrow down at least one problem to a long list.
It doesn't seem to have anything to do w/backslashes.

There seems to be an interaction with importing the module.
If the long list is in __main__, the problem does not occur.
The problem only occurs when the list is in an imported module
and only after importing it the second time (after the .pyc
is created).

If a list has 32768+ items there seems to be a memory problem.
There is an exception, then a crash.  Here's the exception:

TypeError: unsupported operand type(s) for &: 'str' and 'str'

Here's a stack trace against CVS version:

#0  chunk_free (ar_ptr=0x401b1620, p=0x8156a10) at malloc.c:3180
#1  0x400fdbf4 in __libc_free (mem=0x8156a18) at malloc.c:3154
#2  0x0805c0db in list_dealloc (op=0x401c4eac) at
Objects/listobject.c:214
#3  0x080c7618 in PyDict_SetItem (op=0x401bd79c,
key=0x401c4ec0, 
    value=0x80e185c) at Objects/dictobject.c:373
#4  0x080c93f9 in PyDict_SetItemString (v=0x401bd79c,
key=0x80d9070 "path", 
    item=0x80e185c) at Objects/dictobject.c:1895
#5  0x08099ad8 in PyImport_Cleanup () at Python/import.c:286
#6  0x080a266d in Py_Finalize () at Python/pythonrun.c:228
#7  0x08053766 in Py_Main (argc=2, argv=0xbffff904) at
Modules/main.c:379