diff --git a/src/zope/tal/talgettext.py b/src/zope/tal/talgettext.py
index 4d8de80..a4e3917 100644
--- a/src/zope/tal/talgettext.py
+++ b/src/zope/tal/talgettext.py
@@ -44,6 +44,10 @@
 from zope.tal.taldefs import TALExpressionError
 from zope.i18nmessageid import Message
 
+PY3 = sys.version_info > (3,)
+if PY3:
+    unicode = str
+
 pot_header = '''\
 # SOME DESCRIPTIVE TITLE.
 # Copyright (C) YEAR ORGANIZATION
@@ -64,6 +68,7 @@
 
 NLSTR = '"\n"'
 
+
 def usage(code, msg=''):
     # Python 2.1 required
     print(__doc__, file=sys.stderr)