Abstract: The book examines the literary means and methods of narration used in the texts of Old Russian literature of the 11^th–13^th centuries and giving them extraordinary expressiveness, brightness, and sometimes figurativeness. The greatest attention is paid to the chronicles ― the famous Tale of Bygone Years, which will soon be 900 years old. There are excursions into the history of social mentality of the most old period. The book is intended for medievalists, teachers, students and all those on whom reading of Russian literature makes an aesthetic impression.