* Fixes#791
* Changing to recommended patch by @georgepsarakis
* Revert "Fixes #791"
This reverts commit 5593505dd9.
* Updated to make tests pass
* Made _ensure_str a private function
* Code formatting for flake8
* Added a mock of the newstr and newbytes classes to create a failing test that simulates the issue with using python-future under 2.7.