The article deals with the ways of syntactic implementation of the concept “mental work” in one of the chapters of A. Belyi’s autobiographical novel “Kotik Letaev”. The article reveals the basic syntactic schemes representing the thinking discourse of the character, the bases of which are the verbs of thinking, understanding, cognition, imagination, memory. The attention is focused on the specific text implementation of the five structural schemes in the aspect of the inner life of the individual as represented by the author.