One of the main trends of modern Russian literature (V. Pelevin, V. Sorokin, A. Rubanov, A. Starobinets, A. Ivanov, E. Nekrasova, etc.) — is constant appeal to myth and folklore as inexhaustible sources of plots, eternal images, ethical conflicts and aesthetic treasures. However, unlike classical forms of aesthetic development of myth and folklore, modern authors complicate the forms of dialogue with tradition as much as possible, presenting in modern prose such texts in which the mythological principle does not manifest itself in individual authorial neo-mythologism or at the level of language and character system, which, it would seem, is expected and sanctified by the serious history of a number of genres, for example a literary fairy tale or fantasy. Myth (including literary) and folklore can be woven into the fabric of a completely “realistic” artistic narrative, without being embodied in specific images that have a distinctly folkloric origin, without structuring the plot or even forming a genre-stylistic affiliation of the text. In such a case, various author’s strategies of mythopoetic or quasi-mythopoetic writing arise, generating works of a syncretic nature, one of which is E. Verkin’s latest novel “snark snark”, considered in the article.