Attracting much attention in the USA literature of recent years have been the young writers of Russian origin, «the fourth wave» immigrants, writing, as distinct from most of the representatives of the first three «waves», in English. Addressing the English-speaking readers the Russian-American writers meet the assumed expectations of the «target audience» by making great play with Russian classics in their stories about «the mysterious Russian soul». The paper compares two almost simultaneously published novels that employ similar «strategies of the game»: «Memoirs of a Muse» by Lara Vapnyar (2006) and «What Happened to Anna K.» by Irina Reyn (2008). Both novels can be assigned to the genre of metaliterary pseudoautobiographies based on the explicit update of classical Russian texts.