In an academy where women's literature courses meet a healthy demand, anthologies of Korean women writers are lamentably few and far between. Bruce and Ju-Chan Fulton have published two anthologies of contemporary women writers, Words of Farewell (Seattle: Seal Press, 1993) and Wayfarer (Seattle: Women in Translation, 1997), and have provided crucial literary texts from the postwar era. There is also Jin-Young Choi's lesser-known Unspoken Voices (Dumont, N.J.: Homa & Sekey, 2002). Yung-hee Kim's Questioning Minds is a much-anticipated and much-needed addition to this meager list of translated anthologies and related English-language resources on Korean women writers and Korean women in general, one that deserves to become a staple in courses on Korean literature, women's literature, and feminist studies on Asian women.

Kim opens with a brief but informative introduction to women's literature from the colonial period to the 1990s, and each of the ten stories includes extensive biographical information on the author and analysis of the work. Questioning Minds is comprehensive in its coverage, ranging from 1917 to 1995, and includes some urgently sought translations of canonical works by Korean women writers, including “A Girl of Mystery” (1917) by Kim Myŏng-sun, “Kyŏnghŭi” (1918) by Na Hye-sŏk, and “Awakening” (1926) by Kim Wŏn-ju. The collection thus presents all three first-generation Korean New Women writers, which is perhaps its strongest asset. With the addition of this meticulous set of translations, the voices of Korean New Women, including professional writers and others who saw writing as their main venue for political and social activism, are now directly accessible in English.

While Kim is successful in offering “systematically organized introductory and textual material” (p. ix), any thematic approach must be understood for what it excludes as well as what it includes. The ten stories in this collection vary in sociohistorical background, and they are chosen to represent “challenges and dilemmas” during Korea's modernization (p. x). These challenges include a model housewife's crushing suspicions about her husband's infidelity in Han Mu-suk's “Hydrangeas” (1949); a writer whose success strains her relationship with her husband, a mediocre literary talent, in Kang Sin-jae's “The Mist” (1950); nostalgia sparked by encountering an old flame separated when Korea divided into North and South in Song Wŏn-hŭi's “When Autumn Leaves Fall” (1961); a young housewife's struggle to overhaul her impoverished in-law family in Yi Sun's “A Dish of Sliced Raw Fish” (1979); the awkwardness of an estranged elderly couple's outing in Yi Sŏk-pong's “The Light at Dawn” (1985); the angst of a woman trying to solve the mystery of her husband's death in Ch'oe Yun's “Stone in Your Heart” (1992); and a widow's romance at the age of sixty in Pak Wan-sŏ's “Dried Flowers” (1995). Individually, each story presents diverse problems that Korean women faced over a period of several decades. Some of the protagonists are also working professionals, which sounds like a nod to spheres beyond the domestic. And yet, with the exception of Ch'oe Yun's, all six other stories from post-1945 revolve around the heaviness and suffering experienced by housewives, as constituted within kinship and marriage. This consistency among stories is a feature of Kim's selection, which seems to overrepresent images of hardship and misery among Korean women, and also their obsession with domestic households.

Kim acknowledges the limitations imposed by her choice of theme in explaining the conspicuous omission of stories from the 1930s, the heyday of colonial women writers: “[n]ot all modern Korean women writers … are interested in probing gender-related or feminist issues” (p. xi). It seems, though, that this explanation defines “feminist issues” narrowly, not only in selecting works strictly confined to domestic affairs, but also in excluding works concerned with sociohistorical issues that may be equally viewed as feminist and gender related. As a result, Kim lists major socialist-inclined women writers such as Pak Hwa-sŏng, Kang Kyŏng-ae, and Paek Sin-ae in her historical overview, but nonetheless excludes them from the anthology. Kim also mentions women writers from the late 1980s and beyond and the sea changes in their themes and style, but the presented works from that era do not reflect such shifts. Women's sexuality and body, a topic more prominent among post-1990s writers but also a major focus since the 1970s for writers such as O Chŏng-hŭi, is absent as well.

One cannot include the full spectrum of stories by Korean women writers in one anthology, of course. But there is a danger of producing and reinforcing a stereotype of Korean households and women as strictly bound in domestic struggles, and of presenting them as exclusive preoccupations in Korean women's literature. The challenge, then, is to explain to students the origins of the resilient, strong, socially active, and independent Korean women with whom they are more familiar through literary and cinematic works produced from the 1990s to the present.

For its quality of translations, sound balance of information, and breadth of survey (with the caveats observed), Questioning Minds is eagerly recommended to anyone who is seeking an anthology of women writers from the non-English world. I applaud the appearance of this timely collection, and hope that Kim might one day offer another collection whose choice of stories provides a complementary sense of tone, issues, and aspirations relevant to broader gender issues in Korea, one that hints at sources of social activism, resilience, independence of mind, optimism, and also humor in Korean literature.