diff --git a/ChangeLog b/ChangeLog
index af77bda63879855a3a79d34d330ff86d06694171..85622029bc95a7258c108903819da3d9a23a7117 100644
--- a/ChangeLog
+++ b/ChangeLog
@@ -1,3 +1,7 @@
+2013-01-19 Chris Allegretta <chrisa@asty.org>
+        * configure.ac: Make ncursesw checking dependent on the presence of ncursesw.h, 
+          since without the header files we can't compile.
+
 2013-01-13 Chris Allegretta <chrisa@asty.org>
         * src/utils.c (parse_num): Initalize errno before calling strtol().  Fixes issue
           where trying to go to a line number too long will break legitimate goto-lines
diff --git a/configure.ac b/configure.ac
index c6c5e52370b93ebd3bbb5e0047acf95df539b47f..c1eb123c640a0937c054fc6770803b4652af8873 100644
--- a/configure.ac
+++ b/configure.ac
@@ -441,16 +441,17 @@ if eval "test x$CURSES_LIB_NAME = x"; then
     AC_CHECK_HEADERS(ncurses.h)
 
     if test x$enable_utf8 != xno; then
-	AC_CHECK_HEADERS(ncursesw/ncurses.h)
-        AC_CHECK_TOOL(NCURSESW_CONFIG, ncursesw5-config, no)
-        if test "x$NCURSESW_CONFIG" != xno; then
-            CURSES_LIB=`$NCURSESW_CONFIG --libs`
-            CPPFLAGS="`$NCURSESW_CONFIG --cflags` $CPPFLAGS"
-            CURSES_LIB_NAME=ncursesw
-            CURSES_LIB_WIDE=yes
-        else
-            AC_CHECK_LIB(ncursesw, get_wch, [CURSES_LIB="-lncursesw" CURSES_LIB_NAME=ncursesw CURSES_LIB_WIDE=yes])
-        fi
+	AC_CHECK_HEADERS(ncursesw/ncurses.h, [
+            AC_CHECK_TOOL(NCURSESW_CONFIG, ncursesw5-config, no)
+            if test "x$NCURSESW_CONFIG" != xno; then
+                CURSES_LIB=`$NCURSESW_CONFIG --libs`
+                CPPFLAGS="`$NCURSESW_CONFIG --cflags` $CPPFLAGS"
+                CURSES_LIB_NAME=ncursesw
+                CURSES_LIB_WIDE=yes
+             else
+                AC_CHECK_LIB(ncursesw, get_wch, [CURSES_LIB="-lncursesw" CURSES_LIB_NAME=ncursesw CURSES_LIB_WIDE=yes])
+            fi
+        ])
     fi
 
     if eval "test x$CURSES_LIB_NAME = x"; then