The silence of children in Euripides

Theater is basically the imitation of another person or another living being. Imitation is an instinct found in children, primitive people and living beings, explains Metin And. In order to teach their children to speak, a person wants their children to imitate them. A bird imitates its mother in order to learn to fly. The imitation found in life itself has turned into play, and play has turned into the theater we know today. What processes have been gone through until the transformation has taken place? Did theater suddenly fall from the sky to the heads of the Athenians? Or did it emerge from that primitive person who thought of imitating animals to lure his prey into his trap? Who were the practitioners of the first drama? It is not possible to know. But it can be guessed. We do not know who the first person was, but the stages in the growth of the first child are the same as the stages in the growth of today's children. A child uses imitation to learn to chew, talk and walk. A child grows up by imitating his parents and other living beings around him. Therefore, the first practitioners of drama must be children. A study was conducted from imitation to play, from play to today's theatre. In ancient Greek theatre, where the foundations of today's theatre were laid, why are children, the first practitioners of drama, silent? In the universe of tragedies that include religions, highly virtuous people, the difficulties of being a woman, moral boundaries, and discussions on education, only children have not found the place they deserve. The answer to this problem was sought in the works of Euripides, the unconventional, realistic, and fearless Attic author whose tragedies have survived to the present day. The answers found in this article will be discussed. Euripides' characters are heroes with psychological depth, who openly experience their weaknesses and passions. Euripides, who reveals the ugliness of human nature and does not hesitate to push the boundaries of religious values, who uses the gods that ancient people were devoted to as he wishes, and even destroys the sublime Greek moral understanding, spoke through his heroes in all public areas. Women complained about being women, lovers talked about their impossible loves, powerful heroes rebelled against the wrath of the gods, the gods ordered them to be obeyed, men announced the duties of women, choruses sang songs about the universal order and leaders made politics, but why didn't children talk about the difficulties of being a child, their right to life or their hopes? Why did Euripides, who made all family members, slaves, politicians and gods talk, use children only as a symbolic tool to strengthen his drama? In the play Media, where child cruelty takes place, why weren't the passages in the mouths of the children who were killed, expressing their pain, written or why did the chorus take on this task? Wasn't childhood respected in the time Euripides lived in? Didn't the ancient people of Attica take children seriously until they became adults and strong? Were children seen as creatures made only for the continuation of the lineage or to take care of their mothers and fathers when they got old? Or did Euripides not write children because he would have difficulty finding child actors? Couldn't male actors who disguised themselves as women also disguise themselves as children? And why were children always the ones who suffered the most in Euripides? In order to penetrate Euripides' thought system, his works, his life, and ancient and modern views about him were used. Euripides was tried to be analyzed as a writer, as a person, and as an Athenian. His plays were examined in detail and opened to discussion. A journey was made to Attic theater, passing through the doors opened by the ancient writer, and the concept of children was discussed. In the literature study conducted, no thesis written on such a subject was found before. In this respect, this thesis is a first.