perl style formating

[Les Ander]

Hi,
i am new to python.

say i wanted to print out 3 variable in the following format:
$name is left justified and has the width of size 10
$comment is left justified and starts at column 11 and ends at 40
$line starts at 41 and is of variable length)

in perl i would write it as:

format OUT =
@<<<<<<<<<< >@<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<    >@*
$name, $comment, $line;
.
$~="OUT";

how do i write it in python?

thanks
les