The article deals with the analysis of contemporary prose in terms of literary manifestos (from postmodernists’ declarations to the “new realists” and “Simpozion” group). The comparative analysis of manifestos is of particular relevance in the situation of cultural paradigm destruction, frustration in the prospects of globalization and the loss of literature-centrism’s principle in Russian culture. The analysis allows presenting the activities of key associations and areas with the possible clarity and declarative exposure. We acknowledge the historical and typological proximity of the situations of the early 20^th and 21^st centuries with their cult of manifestos and similar antinomies: modernism and traditionalism, modernism and realism, «arty» and “Bolsheviks” (“radical realism”, “new realism”). Concerns about the present situation include secondariness of some manifestos’ theses, not supported by the actual fiction texts.