ABSTRACT This article takes up E. M. Forster’s tongue-in-cheek question—“had Skelton a bird complex?”—to explore the function of avian voice in John Skelton’s poetry. Past scholarship has frequently interpreted Skelton’s birds as vehicles of parody or satire. In contrast, this article argues that Skelton’s avian voicing can illuminate the non-semantic or extra-semantic qualities of human language. This argument moves beyond traditional theories of voice that conceptualize voice as a phenomenon experienced by human listeners. Specifically, it examines nonhuman macaronic speech in Phyllyp Sparowe and Speke Parott, two of Skelton’s most popular bird poems. In both poems, birds quote from liturgical or academic sources to access capabilities of language that cohere not in literal or allegorical meanings but affective performance. The first section of this article demonstrates how unauthoritative speakers in Phyllyp Sparowe use macaronic voicing to achieve the affective power of liturgical ritual. The second section explores unauthorized multilingualism in Speke Parott to suggest that nonsense macaronic style was a useful pedagogical tool in premodern literacy training. Both poems, therefore, employ avian speakers to theorize voice as non-lexical sonic material in premodern poetry.

中文翻译：

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约翰·斯凯尔顿（John Skelton）的“鸟群”：Macaronic Voice的实验

摘要本文探讨了EM Forster的开玩笑的问题-“斯凯尔顿有鸟儿吗？”，探讨鸟类声音在约翰·斯凯尔顿诗歌中的作用。过去的奖学金经常将斯克尔顿的鸟类解释为模仿或讽刺的工具。相反，本文认为，斯克尔顿的鸟类发声可以阐明人类语言的非语义或非语义性质。该论点超越了将声音概念化为人类听众所经历的现象的传统声音理论。具体来说，它研究了斯凯尔顿最受欢迎的两首鸟诗《菲利普·斯波罗》和《斯佩克·帕罗特》中的非人类Macaronic语音。在这两首诗中，鸟类都从礼仪或学术资源中引述语言的能力，这些能力不是字面意义或寓言意义，而是情感表现。本文的第一部分演示了Phyllyp Sparowe中没有权威的说话者如何使用Macaronic语音来实现礼仪仪式的情感力量。第二部分探讨了Speke Parott中未经授权的多种语言，以表明胡言乱语的Macaronic风格是前现代素养培训中的有用的教学工具。因此，这两首诗都使用禽类扬声器将声音理论化为前现代诗歌中的非词汇声音材料。