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Abstract: The article is aimed at analyzing the tasks, ways and means of creating the image of abroad as the other world in the works by the modern playwright N. V. Kolyada. A system-oriented analysis of a number of plays by Kolyada shows that the division of space based on political and national principle has a philosophical value for the art system of the playwright by forming an ontologically and axiologically significant «us vs. them» («world» vs. «the other world») opposition. The opposition falls into two subgroups: «here vs. there» (reflects the conflict between reality and dream) and «us vs. them» (embodies different national mentalities confronting each other). The first contrast originates from the discordance of an axiological vacuum, which characters need to exist in and their human nature implying indestructible pursuit of universal values; the second opposition is based on the contrast between mentalities that allows the playwright to stress the features he considers to be distinctive for the «Russian soul». The two oppositions discussed above are uneven in Kolyada’s works: the feeling of something alien that foreign mentality gives is more significant for the characters than the demand for realizing the dream of living abroad that manifests itself in a conscientious objection to emigration. Through examples of particular characters the playwright illustrates the fact that breaching of the integral «inner» space (border crossing) is indeed possible, however, inevitably results in appearing disharmony, duality and destruction of the personality of an «offender», who finally finds oneself excluded both by the world and by the other world and doomed to loneliness.