How do I echo “-e”?

Question

I want to echo a string that might contain the same parameters as echo. How can I do it without modifying the string?

For

Answer 1

The proper bash way is to use printf:

printf "%s\n" "$var"

By the way, your echo didn't work because when you run:

var="-e something"
echo $var

(without quoting $var), echo will see two arguments: -e and something. Because when echo meets -e as its first argument, it considers it's an option (this is also true for -n and -E), and so processes it as such. If you had quoted var, as shown in other answers, it would have worked.