This article provides a description of the ways in which other people’s speech is conveyed in modern and classical prose on the material of the collections of novels Dark Alleys by I.A. Bunin and Foggy Alleys by A. I. Slapovsky. The focus is on several ways: direct speech constructions, free direct speech, and dialogue. This choice is due to the fact that precisely these ways most clearly demonstrate the features of modern prose. The analysis of the stories reveals changes not only in the representation of direct speech and the author’s words, but also in the functions of the extension of the author’s words, among which, for example, appear the expression of linguistic reflection, the distinction between the points of view of the author and the character, the motivation of their verbal behavior. The conclusions are made about the change in the correlation of the parts of the construction with direct speech, which is characterized by binarity. The representation of the above ways of rendering the speech of other people is considered taking into account the variation of the first-person and third-person narrative, as well as the functional and semantic types of speech – informational, demonstrative, sententious, proposed by Professor S. G. Ilyenko. The use of free direct speech is motivated, as well as the convergence of direct speech constructions with statements containing introductory components. The particularities of the presentation of the external and internal speech of the characters are revealed, taking into account the punctuation-graphic arrangement. A specific way of presenting the dialogue in contemporary prose is demonstrated. Through the syntactic lens it was possible to see that Alexei Slapovsky, whose work is marked by attention to the contemporary, demonstrated not only changes in language, but also changes in the attitude of people of different generations to the word, thought, love.