diff --git a/atomicwrites/__init__.py b/atomicwrites/__init__.py
index 1859e83..5592ec4 100644
--- a/atomicwrites/__init__.py
+++ b/atomicwrites/__init__.py
@@ -9,6 +9,12 @@
 except ImportError:
     fcntl = None
 
+# `fspath` was added in Python 3.6
+try:
+    from os import fspath
+except ImportError:
+    fspath = None
+
 __version__ = '1.3.0'
 
 
@@ -137,6 +143,10 @@ def __init__(self, path, mode=DEFAULT_MODE, overwrite=False,
         if 'w' not in mode:
             raise ValueError('AtomicWriters can only be written to.')
 
+        # Attempt to convert `path` to `str` or `bytes`
+        if fspath is not None:
+            path = fspath(path)
+
         self._path = path
         self._mode = mode
         self._overwrite = overwrite