Dilemmas of Working Women

A spiky, edgy collection of five sly yet sensitive stories spotlighting clear-eyed and "difficult" women who are navigating their identities as workers and women in contemporary Japan--a feminist, anti-capitalist modern classic published outside Asia and in English for the first time. The Dilemmas of Working Women is Fumio Yamamoto`s darkly witty look at modern Japanese women who are ambivalent about their lives and jobs. In "Naked," a woman who`s simultaneously lost her business and her husband finds that it is surprisingly comfortable to stay at home sewing stuffed animals, even if it makes her a "loser" in the eyes of society. In "Planarian," a young woman recovering from breast cancer tells her friends and boyfriend that she would prefer to be the titular worm to organically regenerate her body. Each of these spiky women--as well as the three other protagonists in this groundbreaking work--chafes against social expectations that equate work with worth and demand women squeeze into the confining and sometimes dehumanizing role of employee in a world built by and for men. First published in Japan in 2000, The Dilemmas of Working Women struck a nerve with Japanese readers and became a bestselling literary sensation, selling nearly half a million copies and winning the prestigious Naoki Prize in Literature. A quarter of a century later, this brilliant modern classic--available for the first time outside Asia and in English--remains deliciously funny and astonishingly relevant. Translated from the Japanese by Brian Bergstrom