diff --git a/atom.go b/atom.go
index 24c163a..5b471c6 100644
--- a/atom.go
+++ b/atom.go
@@ -28,6 +28,18 @@ func isValidURI(uri URI) bool {
 	return isValidURL(uri) || isValidURN(uri)
 }
 
+func isCorrectlyEscaped(text string) bool {
+	relevantEntities := []string{"&", "<", ">", """, "'"}
+
+	for _, entity := range relevantEntities {
+		if strings.Contains(text, entity) {
+			return false
+		}
+	}
+
+	return true
+}
+
 func isCompositeMediaType(mediaType string) bool {
 	mediaType, _, err := mime.ParseMediaType(mediaType)
 	if err != nil {
diff --git a/category.go b/category.go
index aa9f547..9e90dd3 100644
--- a/category.go
+++ b/category.go
@@ -3,6 +3,7 @@ package atomfeed
 import (
 	"errors"
 	"fmt"
+	"html"
 )
 
 type Category struct {
@@ -22,6 +23,10 @@ func NewCategory(term string) (*Category, error) {
 	return &Category{Term: term, Content: content}, nil
 }
 
+func (c *Category) SetLabel(label string) {
+	c.Label = html.UnescapeString(label)
+}
+
 func (c *Category) Check() error {
 	if c.Term == "" {
 		return errors.New("term attribute of category empty")
@@ -33,6 +38,10 @@ func (c *Category) Check() error {
 		}
 	}
 
+	if !isCorrectlyEscaped(c.Label) {
+		return fmt.Errorf("label attribute of category %v not correctly escaped", c.Label)
+	}
+
 	if c.Content == nil {
 		return errors.New("no content element of category")
 	} else {
diff --git a/plainText.go b/plainText.go
index 6d4eb3d..149fcd2 100644
--- a/plainText.go
+++ b/plainText.go
@@ -15,6 +15,10 @@ func (p *PlainText) Check() error {
 		return errors.New("type attribute of plain text must be text or html if not omitted")
 	}
 
+	if p.Type == "html" && !isCorrectlyEscaped(p.Text) {
+		return errors.New("text element of plain text not correctly escaped")
+	}
+
 	if p.Text == "" {
 		return errors.New("text element of plain text empty")
 	}
diff --git a/text.go b/text.go
index 221ba7c..96c548d 100644
--- a/text.go
+++ b/text.go
@@ -15,7 +15,7 @@ func NewText(textType, content string) (Text, error) {
 	case "text", "":
 		return &PlainText{Type: textType, Text: content}, nil
 	case "html":
-		return &PlainText{Type: textType, Text: html.EscapeString(content)}, nil
+		return &PlainText{Type: textType, Text: html.UnescapeString(content)}, nil
 	case "xhtml":
 		return &XHTMLText{
 			Type: textType,