I came across the problem when I was using `C-u C-x =' on a SLIME presentation. After some debugging, I found out the cause of the problem. Here is it: In a slime REPL buffer, when the evaluation result is rendered, SLIME adds text properties using `slime-add-presentation-properties'. One of the text properties is a syntax-table `slime-presentation-syntax-table'. `C-u C-x =' calls `(describe-char (point))', which in turn calls `describe-text-properties', which hangs with 100% cpu usage. I think a possible fix could be done in `describe-property-list', adding a case in cond to handle the type of syntax-table, something like: diff --git a/lisp/descr-text.el b/lisp/descr-text.el index 6c7983a177..926103f35e 100644 --- a/lisp/descr-text.el +++ b/lisp/descr-text.el @@ -90,6 +90,7 @@ describe-property-list 'type 'help-face 'help-args (list value))) ((widgetp value) (describe-text-widget value)) + ((syntax-table-p value) (insert "#")) (t (describe-text-sexp value)))) (insert "\n")))