The objectives of this thesis are multiple: to prove that myths, as part of literature and culture, take part in the process of construction and deconstruction of gender stereotypes; to analyze selected stories of contemporary Russian writers L. Petrushevskaya and L. Ulitskaya (Medea - Medea, Medea and her children - Medea i ee deti) through the definition of “women’s literature”, as a field determined by the awareness of the gender construction of culture and the deconstruction of traditional gender stereotypes; and, finally, to show how the aforementioned writers of contemporary 20th-century Russian literature use the myth of Medea to point out the cultural-literary and historical underpinnings of gender stereotypes. Before the analysis, the paper explains the concepts of myth and mythology and how they reflect the culture and thus store cultural constructs, especially with gender stereotypes of masculinity and femininity. It also introduces the original Greek myth of Medea and briefly explains how it was transmitted and influenced literature and culture. Furthermore, the paper points out the connection between social changes in 20th-century Russian society and the emergence of female writers and “women’s literature” and how these changes and phenomena have affected women’s writing and women’s views on gender issues. These writers and their works appear as part of all the above because in their works gender deconstruction is an important element of the composition. Lyudmila Petrushevskaya’s Medea presents a shattered image of the traditional family and woman in Russia at the end of the 20th century, establishes an author’s version of Medea and perpetuates the idea that every woman can be Medea if she finds herself in such a position. In Lyudmila Ulitskaya’s work, the premise of Medea as the killer of her children is completely rejected by depriving the main character of the possibility of giving birth. Starting from this premise, Ulitskaya creates her female heroines differently: each of them embodies traditional male patterns of behaviour and demolish features that traditionally belong to the masculine and feminine genders. Lyudmila Petrushevskaya through her even more cruel version of Medea gives social commentary on the destroyed society and the only version of femininity that results from that same society, while Lyudmila Ulitskaya creates her own micro-universe in which she destroys typical male-female relationships by subtly giving characters the opposite gender.