ENThe study of the image of Vilnius in fiction literature distinguishes two most important components of the urban landscape, its architectural appearance and visual presentation – Castle Hill with Gediminas’ Tower and Christian churches. Poems by Fyodor Tyutchev, Valery Bryusov, poetic and prose works by Alexander Zhirkevich, Ilya Ehrenburg, Andrey Klyonov and other authors of the late 19th and 20th centuries act as a research material. Remains of the castle with the tower on a hill in the historical heart of Vilnius remind us of its original nature as a capital city, sovereign greatness, and twists and turns of history. Gothic, and mainly Baroque temples, express imperishable Christian values. Mostly Catholic temples are complemented by Orthodox churches. This combination reflects the complex interaction of Western and Eastern cultural worlds, in the borderlands of which Vilnius is located. Keywords: city, imagery, poetosphere, cultural borderlands.