Turgenev's and Dostoevsky's novels, analysed in their relation to the future modernism, are studied both from the morphological standpoint (The Smoke) and the anthropological standpoint (The Newly Cleared Land, Brothers Karamazov-Artsibashev's Saninor Solovyov's Silver Dove).The main attention is paid to the problematic heroes, most of whom had to decease. The only exception is the hedonic Sanin-the first representative of Russian pragmatism.Immediate continuation has been found in the morphological and anthropological standpoints, even if differentiated by the change of the philosophy of life (Sanin) and by growing conflicts in the social situation, ethics and style (The Silver Dove).