diff --git a/autogen/configure b/autogen/configure
index b75800f11ea..8d64e1d0a2e 100755
--- a/autogen/configure
+++ b/autogen/configure
@@ -4041,7 +4041,7 @@ for var in "`pwd`" "$temp_srcdir" "$prefix" "$exec_prefix" \
     "$datarootdir" "$bindir" "$datadir" "$sharedstatedir" "$libexecdir"; do
 
     case "$var" in
-    *[^\ -~]*) as_fn_error "Emacs cannot be built or installed in a directory whose name contains non-ASCII characters: $var" "$LINENO" 5 ;;
+    *[!\ -~]*) as_fn_error "Emacs cannot be built or installed in a directory whose name contains non-ASCII characters: $var" "$LINENO" 5 ;;
   esac
 
 done