Abstract
The article is devoted to comparative analysis of images and motifs in the novels KalechinaMalechina by Evgenia Nekrasova and I Will Be a Smart Girl by Huang Beijia, about teenage girls. These texts reveal similarities at the level of the image system, the archetypal motifs and the inner development of the mythological plot about the initiation of a child into adulthood. However, many similar motifs in the novels appear in contrasting functions: E. Nekrasova's novel shows the joyless world of an unloved child, while in Huang Beijia's novel we see the world of a wholesome and well-loved child, suffering from her own school failures. The artistic method of the novels is examined in relation to their mythological motifs. The Chinese text gravitates towards the traditions of socialist realism, performing one of its functions most characteristic of teenage literature – didacticism. Huang Beijia's novel can be described as a didactic auteur tale based on biographical material. The Russian text has been described by scholars as «magical» realism and is more than just an initiation novel or a didactic tale. It realises the eternal philosophical sense of the impact of love or its absence on human fate, the ontological abandonment of the human soul facing indifference or aggression from the world around it. It is not the protagonist's initiation but her ability to «survive» without losing herself that is central to the Russian novel.
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