diff --git a/lib/graph_commit.rb b/lib/graph_commit.rb
index ef5e91c6..0080e856 100644
--- a/lib/graph_commit.rb
+++ b/lib/graph_commit.rb
@@ -96,7 +96,7 @@ class GraphCommit
     h[:parents] = self.parents.collect do |p|
       [p.id,0,0]
     end
-    h[:author]  = author.name
+    h[:author]  = author.name.force_encoding("UTF-8")
     h[:time]    = time
     h[:space]   = space
     h[:refs]    = refs.collect{|r|r.name}.join(" ") unless refs.nil?