Birth of Tomas Tranströmer

Tomas Tranströmer was born on 15 April 1931 in Stockholm. A Swedish poet, psychologist and translator, Transtromer wrote compact poems with striking imagery that often draw on nature and dreams and on the sense of a hidden connection beneath ordinary life. His collections include 17 Poems, Windows and Stones and The Sorrow Gondola, and his poetry has been translated into more than sixty languages. He worked for years as a psychologist, including with juvenile offenders. A stroke in 1990 left him unable to speak fluently, though he continued to write and compose for the piano. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2011.

Open on the timeline