Avraham Shlonsky (March 6, 1900 – May 18, 1973; ; ) was an Israeli poet and editor born in the Russian Empire. He was influential in the development of modern Hebrew and its literature in Israel through his many acclaimed translations of literary classics, particularly from Russian, as well as his own original Hebrew children's classics. Known for his humor, Shlonsky earned the nickname "Lashonsky" from the wisecrackers of his generation (lashon means "tongue", i.e., "language") for his unusually clever and astute innovations in the newly evolving Hebrew language. Biography Avraham Shlonsky was born into a Hasidic family in Kryukovo (Poltava guberniya, now a part of Kremenchuk, Ukraine). His father, Tuvia, was a Chabad Hasid, and his mother, Tzippora, was a Russian revolutionary. When she was pregnant with her sixth child, she hid illegal posters on her body. Five-year-old Avraham informed on his mother, leading to her arrest. Four of his siblings were prodigies. His younger sister was composer and pianist Verdina Shlonsky. In 1913, when Shlonsky was 13, he was sent to Ottoman Palestine to study at the prestigious Herzliya Hebrew High School in Tel Aviv. When the First World War broke out, he returned to Ukraine. In 1921, the whole family moved to Mandatory Palestine. Tuvia Shlonsky worked as a warehouse manager and bookkeeper in the Shemen factory in Haifa. Avraham was a manual laborer, paving roads and working in construction along with other members of the Third Aliyah. He joined Gdud Ha'avoda and helped to establish Kibbutz Ein Harod in the Jezreel Valley. He married Lucia but conducted a secret affair with Mira Horowitz, the wife of a friend and colleague, with whom he had a child in 1936. Avraham Shlonsky died in Tel Aviv in 1973. Literary career Shlonsky published his first poem in 1919 in the newspaper Ha-Shiloah. He contributed to Jewish cultural life with songs for satirical stage productions, as well as the Purim holiday costume balls that were a tradition in early Tel Aviv. Even at this early stage in his career as a poet, he showed a tendency for witty writing, incorporating linguistic innovations in the revived and developing Hebrew language. During this period, he edited the literary columns of several newspapers. Gradually, he became the representative of the "rebel" group that rebelled against the poetry of Bialik and his generation, expressing a particular aversion to what was seen as their characteristic