diff --git a/Lib/sgmllib.py b/Lib/sgmllib.py
index 9f4819caa27..501fe36d79d 100644
--- a/Lib/sgmllib.py
+++ b/Lib/sgmllib.py
@@ -354,7 +354,7 @@ class SGMLParser:
     def handle_charref(self, name):
         try:
             n = int(name)
-        except string.atoi_error:
+        except ValueError:
             self.unknown_charref(name)
             return
         if not 0 <= n <= 255: