[michaelcampbell]

Under the presumption that he means `bash` when he says "the Linux shell", does the Ctrl-v trick work in both emacs and vi modes?

[Pete_D]

Yes; it's a readline command called quoted-insert and is by default bound to ctrl-V in both modes.

    $ set -o vi; bind -q quoted-insert
    quoted-insert can be invoked via "\C-v".