Fashion Week a-go-go!

With snow hitting our blustery Isles it seems only apt that we suspend our pastel-shaded perennial musings and wrap ourselves up in the enviable warmth of the A/W '12 collections. Fashion followers the world-over have just under two weeks of insatiable anticipation as London Fashion Week goes LIVE on the 17th. With a scorching schedule set to wet the appetite of even the most reluctant sartorialist, we can rest assured that the celebrations will kick start London 2012 in style!

As ever the Burberry Prorsum show (live streaming on Monday 20th with location currently all cloak-and-dagger...) is hotly awaited and by nature will draw in a mac-claded, glittery array of famous faces. After last season's collection daringly infused Burberry's synonymous heritage look with a raffia toting, tribal-printed exoticism, there's no telling what trends this fashion emporium will be dictating next. ADIOS to those hushed preconceptions of a English country house slash Wallis Simpson-esque aesthetic.

Burberry Prorsum S/S '12

London Fashion Week stands out through its fervent promotion and dedication to a young generation of edgy and innovative designers. It creates a vital showcase for these irreverent and dynamic talents, offering them prime exposure into the world's media and burgeoning blogosphere. Even with the absence of multi-million pound editorial campaigns and production teams, creatively their businesses have flourished. The BFC/Vogue Designer Fashion Fund acknowledges this great potential and offers well-needed financial support (often being referred to as "the fashion equivalent of a lottery win"). Jonathan Saunders, this year's recipient, is at the forefront of British design. His ability to juxtapose the femininity of delicate silk screened prints with a clean, almost architectural form has won him not only critical acclaim but a legion of enamoured followers.

Jonathan Saunders S/S '11

Tomas Tranströmer... Who?

Last month, when The Nobel Prize in Literature 2011 was awarded to Tomas Tranströmer, Swedish writer, poet and translator, many instantly questioned this obscure choice (some secretly reverting to a google search).

In reality, Tomas Tranströmer is not only Sweden's greatest living poet, but is internationally revered for his intense and unforgettable images that have the masterful ability to transcend cultures. Behind Neruda he is the 20th century's most translated poet. Taking inspiration from his experiences as a psychologist, he continually explores human vulnerability in the face of emotional extremes through encapsulating momentous and pivotal events. He possesses a unique narrative voice full of understanding for human bewilderment and wonder; life is a series of transient states of consciousness interspersed with moments of epiphany.

“The images leap out from the page, so the first-time reader or listener has the immediate feeling of being given something very tangible.”

Although his contemporaries have criticised Tranströmer's literature for being too insular and often detached from the social and political issues of his age, his work continues to resonate universally as "through his condensed, translucent images, he gives us fresh access to reality". His work lies within the surrealist genre as the simple depictions of everyday life and nature reveal a captivating insight into the human mind.

"Each line is weightless and ethereal, yet paradoxically contain such extraordinary power in his ability to transform the human and material world in astonishing ways"

Notable elements of Tranströmer's poems include-

• His work often suggests a photographic imagination, in which light and dark are hauntingly transposed, as in the beautiful opening image of this poem, 

THE COUPLE
They turn the light off, and its white globe glows
an instant and then dissolves, like a tablet
in a glass of darkness. Then a rising.
The hotel walls shoot up into heaven’s darkness.
Their movements have grown softer, and they sleep,
but their most secret thoughts begin to meet
like two colors that meet and run together
on the wet paper in a schoolboy’s painting.
It is dark and silent. The city however has come nearer
tonight. With its windows turned off. Houses have come.
They stand packed and waiting very near,
a mob of people with blank faces.

• His poems have the ability to integrate the irrational with the mundane, forcing us to reexamine and reflect upon the aspects of life that we often overlook. "April and Silence" defamiliarises us by defying the stereotypical images of spring and gives it an underlying tone of eeriness and menace. The shorter lines, and enjambment, give the poem a sparse feeling—making the setting seem empty and lonely.

APRIL AND SILENCE

The velvet-dark ditch
crawls by my side
without reflections.

The only thing that shines
are yellow flowers.

I am cradled in my shadow
like a fiddle
in its black case.

The only thing I want to say
glimmers out of reach
like the silver
at the pawnbroker's.

• His poetry is known for its haunting, emotional quality. He has been called a “buzzard poet” because he often writes from a detached viewpoint, as if hovering over a scene looking for targets. 

• They often contain elements of surrealism, the expression of ideas through bizarre, unexpected images.

Click here to see Tomas's reaction!