diff --git a/Lib/xmlrpclib.py b/Lib/xmlrpclib.py
index 60b05b9..e08d405 100644
--- a/Lib/xmlrpclib.py
+++ b/Lib/xmlrpclib.py
@@ -167,7 +167,7 @@
     # convert to 7-bit ascii if possible
     try:
         return string.decode("ascii")
-    except (UnicodeError, TypeError):
+    except (UnicodeError, TypeError, AttributeError):
         return string
 
 __version__ = "1.0.1"