There are general ideas expressed in notions (in terms) in any branch of human knowledge. Traditionally it can be highlighted as follows: scope of ontological universals, anthropological universals, scope of the national and mental universals, mythological universals or universals, dating back to Antiquity, universals of the Russian spirituality, socio-cultural, language (linguistic) universals or linguistic phenomena (properties, characteristics), found in all languages and common to all languages. There are also translation universals. Literary universal is a textual phenomenon with its own structural and semantic expression and appropriate, that is universal (repeat and total) form. The literary works include the universal situations, the totality of which is characterized by a unique (specific) plot. Based on the novel “At daggers drawn” (1870–1871) the authors of this article consider the implementation of the universal situations of leaving and returning home in Nikolai Leskov’s writing. In constructing the plot of the novel writer resorts to the universal situations of leaving and returning home. The study found that the Leskov’s image of home, as a place with the atmosphere of peace and comfort, agrees with the concept of home in the traditional Russian culture, native to the writer, and causes the characteristic features of the author's worldview. Referring to the universal situations of leaving home and unsuccessful attempts to return, Leskov shows how the loss of the home provokes a degradation of the person, renouncing his roots and his native place, the loss of moral guidelines.