What didn't work about it? I have this in my .gtkrc-2.0:
gtk-key-theme-name="Emacs"
And this in ~/.config/gtk-3.0/settings.ini:
[Settings]
gtk-key-theme-name = Emacs
If those settings appear in both places, after restarting a GTK+ application the bindings should just work. They actually work better than in OS X because you're free to use the Alt/Meta shortcuts to skip words without reaching for the cursor keys.
There are a couple of GTK+ applications that annoyingly override the shortcuts, like Pidgin for example (which binds C-w to "close window").
Yeah, the fact that there isn't UI for this basic pref says a lot about the relationship between desktop environments and "power users"...
(source: http://askubuntu.com/questions/181532/emacs-keybindings-in-u...)