Marcabru's Estornel: On Ventriloquists, or, The Art of Putting Words in your Belly

Abstract

Marcabru’s ‘starling songs’, Estornel, cueill ta volada and Ges l’estornels no·n s’ublida , set up a dialogue among multiple speakers — animal and human — who interact with the troubadour’s own plural identity as poet, composer, performer, and persona. Focusing on his ventriloquistic acrobatics, I examine how Marcabru’s piebald art, embedded in the interplay between performance and reception, mixes courtly seduction and sexual innuendo to stage a burlesque morality play that slips comically among shifting and elusive identities.