The textbook offers experience in building text theory from a communicative perspective. The text is consistently considered in its relation to the participants in communication, as a sign, in relation to the world of reality, the world of texts. Against the background of the history of the development of the doctrine of text, the principles of building a theory of text, its operational orientation towards the interpretive activity of the listener (reader) are demonstrated. The understanding of the text set out in the manual allows you to get closer to comprehending his "life." The book is equipped with questions and tasks for independent work, a bibliographic list. In the second edition (1st - 2003), the text of the book was substantially revised and supplemented with new materials. For graduate students, graduate students of philological specialties, teachers and humanities specialists.