The Swedish Academy has awarded the 2011 Nobel prize for literature to one of its own: the Swedish poet Tomas Tranströmer.

Tranströmer becomes the eighth European to win the world's premier literary award in the past 10 years, following the German

novelist Herta Müller in 2009, the French writer JMG le Clézio in 2008 and the British novelist Doris Lessing in 2007.

Sweden's most famous poet becomes the 104th literature laureate, and is the first poet to take the laurels since Poland's Wislawa

Szymborska in 1996.

Praised by the judges for his "condensed translucent images", which give us "fresh access to reality", Tranströmer's surreal

explorations of the inner world and its relation to the jagged landscape of his native country have been translated into more

than 50 languages.

For full article click here: www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011

There is also a video of Tomas Transtromer here: www.vimeo.com/30809607 .

Tomas Transtromer is published in the UK by Bloodaxe Books.