PHP Missing Slashes - php

Question

I am convinced that the solution is very simple, however I have searched many pages and questions and I am slightly frustrated with the lack of solution.
I'm trying to create a span element which has the onclick property.
The onclick event should pass to the displayStory function path to the text file.
Unfortunately, all slashes are missing.
Slashes are fine if I dont use apostrophes inside $dir, however i have to insert them somehow
PHP:
<?php
$allStories = scandir("./stories");
foreach($allStories as $story){
$dir = "'/stories/$story'";
$element = ("<span class='listElement' onclick='displayStory($dir)'>$story</span>");
echo $element;
}
?>
Output:
<span class="listElement" onclick="displayStory(" stories="" example.txt')'="">example.txt</span>

Answer 1

You need to learn how to escape characters:
<?php
$allStories = scandir("./stories");
foreach($allStories as $story){
// No single quotes here
$dir = "/stories/$story";
// No parenthesis needed to assign a value
// Escape double quotes for attributes preceding them with a backslash \"
// Use single quotes for function parameter
$element = "<span class=\"listElement\" onclick=\"displayStory('$dir');\">$story</span>";
echo $element;
}
?>
Output should be:
<span class="listElement" onclick="displayStory('stories/example.txt');">example.txt</span>