Fania Bergstein (Hebrew: פניה ברגשטיין‎; 11 April 1908 – 18 September 1950)[1] was an Israeli poet, lyricist and author who wrote and published for children and adults.

[2][3] A number of her poems for both children and adults have become Israeli classics and are recognized as touchstones of Israel's literary and cultural heritage;[4][5] many have been set to music.

In 1930, when she was 22, Bergstein immigrated to Mandatory Palestine as part of the Fifth Aliyah and joined Kibbutz Gvat, which had been founded four years earlier in the Jezreel Valley.

[2] Her only child, Gershon Israeli,[25] himself a talented writer and poet, born in 1934, played the mandolin and composed music to some of his mother's verses.

A year after Fania Bergstein's death a special issue of the Kibbutz Gvat newsletter, devoted to her memory, was printed and distributed to the members.

"[26] The first of her poems to be printed was "Khalomi" ("My Dream"), published in 1926 in the daily Hebrew newspaper haYom (Today) in the city of Warsaw, then the center of Polish Jewry; it appeared under the pen name Bat-haOr (The Daughter of Light).

[20] Rachel was expelled from her beloved kibbutz, Degania Aleph, due to being ill with tuberculosis, a contagious and then incurable disease; while Bergstein remained on Gvat, where she suffered from years of poor health.

The contrast of her simple, lovely rhymes about childhood and nature with the dark abyss of Nazi terror is striking and underlines her noble character.

[31] Bergstein's classic book of nursery rhymes for small children, Come to Me, Nice Butterfly (Bo Elay, Parpar Nekhmad) is a slim volume containing eight short, untitled poems and eight color illustrations.

In short verses, the poet depicts the young child's early encounters with nature, the countryside and rural reality.

[citation needed] Some of the poems' subjects are animals: a butterfly, a lamb, a hen and her chicks, a cow and her calf, a dog.

[36] While the poems describe the kibbutz experience of the 1930s and 1940s, they are still beloved by Israeli children and their parents today, whether living in a rural or urban setting.

An educational children's television program called Parpar Nechmad, originally based on Bergstein's first book of poems, was developed for Israeli toddlers aged 2–4 and was telecast from 1982 to 2004.

It was first published in 1952 with pictures in a muted pallet and some in black and white; it was reprinted continually over the years and in 2003 reappeared with full-color drawings by the original illustrator.

It is based upon the second of 32 evenings whose events are related in the obscure story What the Moon Saw[42] by Danish author Hans Christian Andersen, written in 1840.

Besides the three abovementioned books for children by Bergstein, her others were five storybooks: Danny's Golden Ducks (Barvazei haZahav shel Dani, 1945), The Cuckoo (haKukiya, 1947), Racheli, Amos and Ilana (Rakheli, Amos veIlana, 1948), Red Rhymes (Kharuzim Adumim, 1956), Benny and Gita (Beni veGita, 1960) and four more books of poetry: I Knew a Song (Shir Yad'ati, 1954) Between Songs and Gardens (Bein Shirim veGanim, 1956),[3] Blue and Red (Tkhelet veAdom, illustrated by Shmuel Katz, 1967)[45][46] and I Planted a Seed (Gar'in Tamanti, 1968).

Her twelfth children's book was a collection of poems, plays and stories, Happy Eyes (Einayim Smeikhot, illustrated by Tzila Binder, 1961).

[4] She also wrote poems that were published in various publications, such as the weekly children's magazine Mishmar liYeladim which was a supplement of Al haMishmar, owned by and associated with haShomer haTzair Zionist-Socialist youth movement.

Narrated from a child's point of view, it describes the air-raid shelter as a safe, pleasant place, from which sounds of a cricket and a plow can be heard.

The child, ensconced in the shelter, imagines pastoral sights outside, from the lowly grass roots to the lofty treetops, and feels no fear.

Mishmar liYeladim also featured prose and poetry for children by other literary luminaries of the time, such as Lea Goldberg and Avraham Shlonsky.

He notes that her reputation as a children's poet has largely eclipsed her achievement as a writer of prose and poetry for adults; he emphasizes her importance as a voice of her generation.

In particular she wrote, for her adult audience, of the grief and longing of the pioneers in the Land of Israel who had left their families behind in Eastern Europe only to later learn of their brutal annihilation during the Holocaust.

[29] The poem was written in 1944, was set to music by David Zehavi,[52] and has been sung by various artists on different occasions, such as this performance by Meshi Kleinstein.

In it the poet, speaking for her generation of children of Holocaust victims, expresses love and appreciation for her parents and remorse over their sacrifice.

This poem reflects many of the emotions of an entire generation that managed to act on their dreams but needed to pay a price in the process.

Now they sprout offshoots in my blood, Their roots intertwine in my arteries, Your melodies my father, your songs my mother, Awaken and reverberate in my pulse.