diff --git a/spacy/tokens/doc.pyx b/spacy/tokens/doc.pyx
index 72b83720e..771d93804 100644
--- a/spacy/tokens/doc.pyx
+++ b/spacy/tokens/doc.pyx
@@ -111,9 +111,12 @@ cdef class Doc:
     def __unicode__(self):
         return u''.join([t.string for t in self])
 
+    def __str__(self):
+        return u''.join([t.string for t in self])
+
     @property
     def string(self):
-        return unicode(self)
+        return u''.join([t.string for t in self])
 
     @property
     def ents(self):
diff --git a/spacy/tokens/token.pyx b/spacy/tokens/token.pyx
index 194205cc1..bbc12d549 100644
--- a/spacy/tokens/token.pyx
+++ b/spacy/tokens/token.pyx
@@ -34,6 +34,9 @@ cdef class Token:
     def __unicode__(self):
         return self.string
 
+    def __str__(self):
+        return self.string
+
     cpdef bint check_flag(self, attr_id_t flag_id) except -1:
         return check_flag(self.c.lex, flag_id)