ABSTRACT
In placing side by side two names which in many ways have defined the profile of Russian twentieth-century literature, I risk being reproached with making the customary gesture towards the comparative method. However, this comparison is not simply another literary-critical exercise on a set theme, and only a superficial eye would see it as such. It is in fact prompted by the essential quality of each writer: the typology of the spirit and the time can be glimpsed through the poetic typology.
