--- woman.el.orig	2012-05-19 12:08:35.000000000 +1000
+++ woman.el	2012-05-24 07:09:48.000000000 +1000
@@ -2394,17 +2394,20 @@
 	(woman-negative-vertical-space from))
 
     (if woman-preserve-ascii
-	;; Re-instate escaped escapes to just `\' and unpaddable
-	;; spaces to just `space', without inheriting any text
-	;; properties.  This is not necessary, UNLESS the buffer is to
-	;; be saved as ASCII.
+	;; Re-instate escaped escapes to just `\' and unpaddable spaces to
+	;; just `space'.  This is not necessary for display since there's
+	;; display table entries for the escaped chars, but it is necessary
+	;; if the buffer might be saved as ASCII.
+	;;
+	;; `subst-char-in-region' preserves text properties on the
+	;; characters, which is necessary for bold, underline, etc on \e.
+	;; There's usually no face on spaces, but if there is then it's good
+	;; to keep that too.
 	(progn
-	  (goto-char from)
-	  (while (search-forward woman-escaped-escape-string nil t)
-	    (delete-char -1) (insert ?\\))
-	  (goto-char from)
-	  (while (search-forward woman-unpadded-space-string nil t)
-	    (delete-char -1) (insert ?\ ))))
+          (subst-char-in-region from (point-max)
+                                woman-escaped-escape-char ?\\)
+          (subst-char-in-region from (point-max)
+                                woman-unpadded-space-char ?\ )))
 
     ;; Must return the new end of file if used in format-alist.
     (point-max)))