Abstract
The article is devoted to the actual issue of studying literature at school through the prism of theoryand methods of comparative studies. The most important matter is the overall application of the comparativemethod theory (comparatism) in literature lessons and its widespread use in practice. The authorsemphasize that literary comparative studies are one of the modern directions, which is focused on ensuringthe cultural identification of the student and the advancement of his or her critical independence. Italso focuses on ideas about the historical and literary process and the ways of development of literature.The potential of such comparative methods as: comparing literary characters of same work, comparingits episodes, employing comparative analysis to trace the influence of the landscape on the mindset orspirits of the character, as well as comparing various authors belonging to the same era but coming fromdifferent cultural and national backgrounds are considered that allows students to achieve a completeunderstanding of the work’s ideas, and its interpretation, thus revealing the general laws of a unitaryliterary and cultural process. We can identify a working classification of comparative study of differentkinds of literature. Recommendations for the types of exercises are given: speech exercises for teachingwritten messages; written speech exercises for working with printed text; comparative tests after readingthe work; a test based on the character, work, author, literary direction; a proposal to interpret the workor work of the author as a whole (photo, video- collage) to the work or presentation in the form of historicaland / or cultural commentary on the selected topic, etc.Key words: comparative studies, teaching literature, text analysis, comparatism, comparative method.