Your questions aren't lame. They are common confusions from those who come from a not-so-mathy background. Your first question: Shouldn't the return type be of (Char, [Char])? suggests that you're confusing the type synonym of (Parser a), which is String -> (a, String), with just the right-hand-side, (a, String). Your "z" expression has type Parser ([Char], Char), which means the same thing as String -> ((String, Char), String). How did that happen? Because item `bind` (\x -> (\y -> result (x,y))) "Rohit" is equivalent to item `bind` ( (\x -> (\y -> result (x,y))) "Rohit" ) as those last two expressions go together by the parsing rules. So what you actually have is item `bind` (\y -> result ("Rohit",y)) The first argument to bind has type Parser Char, the second argument (a -> Parser (String,a)). The result is exactly what's expected: Parser (String, Char), i.e. String -> ((String, Char), String). p.s. This might be what you're looking for: Try evaluating item "Rohit" in the repl. -- Kim-Ee