King's College London

How can literature help us understand a world shaped by migration, translation, empire, and cultural encounter?This MA in Comparative Literature approaches literary study as a critical practice for thinking across time and space, examining how texts move, transform, and generate meaning through history, comparison, and connection. The programme develops advanced theoretical and interdisciplinary approaches, encouraging students to draw on London’s rich cultural ecosystem where libraries, museums, and archives serve as a laboratory for original and forward-looking research.

You will be taught by world-leading academics whose research expertise ranges from the ancient world to twenty-first-century European, Asian, Middle Eastern, African, and American literature from both Hemispheres. All modules are taught with English translations, and you’ll also be able to develop your language skills to read literature in its original language.

Course essentials
This comparative literature master’s will teach you how to analyse and evaluate theories at the forefront of current literary scholarship. You’ll discover how to deploy these yourself and develop the skills to conduct research and communicate your findings at a postgraduate level.

Your MA in comparative literature has two required modules and a compulsory dissertation. You’ll start by looking at contemporary debates in the field of theorising literature across cultures. This required module focuses on an overarching theme and will be taught each week by a different specialist from the comparative literature programme. The structure not only facilitates your cross-cultural reading on a topical issue but also introduces other ways of working comparatively.

You’ll investigate how we read literature across cultures, geographies, languages, and time. Once you’re familiar with the contemporary debates and variety of perspectives within this field, you’ll learn how to analyse and evaluate each theory and then deploy them effectively.

The other required module runs for the duration of your course and will equip you with the research skills you’ll need to conduct your dissertation at the end of your comparative literature master’s. It provides a solid foundation for your independent research and prepares you to write a literature review and give an oral presentation of your project before drafting your dissertation.

The rest of your MA is built from optional modules. At least half of these come from the comparative literature syllabus, which offers a wide range of options. For example, you could explore the world novel and consider what it means to read in translation, how we read differently outside the national canon, how we write for a world audience, cultures of human rights, and more.

You may opt to explore queer connections and male-male desire in the classical past or think about the significance and processes of translation in colonial and postcolonial India. You could also learn how to analyse and critically comment on how literature informed by the history of slavery and its legacy uses mythological tropes from Greece, Africa and the Americas, for example.

It’s also possible to choose from a broader list of optional modules within the Faculty of Arts & Humanities. This includes the opportunity to pick up a language with modules from the King’s Language Centre, empowering you to read literature in its original language alongside its English translation.

You’ll complete your Comparative Literature MA with a dissertation on a topic of your choice. This allows you to consider literary works from two or more different cultures, languages, mediums or disciplines in greater depth.

As a comparative literature student, you’ll have access to a range of opportunities to enhance your education. For example, you could attend research seminars or get involved with related student magazines. You’ll also hear from people within the publishing industry who will share their expertise during guest lectures.

This comparative literature master’s is designed to be an enriching and rewarding programme, whether you're looking to study your favourite interests in more depth for a year (or two part-time) or you want to gain excellent research skills to pursue further study and a PhD.

Thanks to our central London location, you’ll have a wealth of cultural and literary resources on your doorstep, including the British Museum, the British Library, and the British Film Institute.