This study examined how Japanese women were described in Korean and Japanese novels just after the defeat of Japan in the Pacific War, and what meanings the writers gave to the women. In Hwang Sun‐won’s Sul Iyagi (A Wine Story), Korean men’s eye to Japanese women left in Korea (North Korea) after the defeat of Japan is multi‐layered. In the story, the Japanese woman is described as an old and ugly body from which femininity has faded away, but the Korean hero reigns over the woman as a despotic man. Japanese women left in Korea (North Korea) after the end of the war have uncertain identities as ‘maidservants’ and ‘people of the defeated country.’On the contrary, in his novel Shayo (斜陽), Dazai Osamu spotlights women’s self‐initiative. Japanese women, who is a descendent of a ruined noble family, has to lead a wretched life after the defeat in the war, but with reformed personality she admits the wounds of the war and explores a new life. Japanese women’s vital strength that cultivates her life through physical labor germinated when she was conscripted for the war. The author shows that the vital strength formed during the war is the embryo of a new human born after the war. In the process that she accomplishes self‐reform, she borrows the dignity of a revolutionist and the authority of Christianity. Japanese women described in Korean and Japanese postwar novels just after the Pacific War are a meaningful code. There is a big difference in male writers’ view of Japanese women depicted in Korean and Japanese novels written just after the Pacific War, but seen from a large frame, both describe women as ones who have to endure the wounds of the war.