It looks like ncurses 5.10 will contain A_ITALIC
. The change went in on September 31 2013:
http://invisible-island.net/ncurses/NEWS-contents.html#t20130831
pdcurses supports A_ITALIC
as well so there's at least a vague nod to compatibility. Unfortunately, this won't help me much until 5.10 is released and then becomes widespread...