Bocage is a Norman word which has entered both the French and English languages. It may refer to a small forest, a decorative element of leaves, a terrain of mixed woodland and pasture, or a type of rubble-work, comparable with the English use of 'rustic' in relation to garden ornamentation.
Bocage probably derives from the Norman French word boscage, from the Old French root bosc ("wood"), which today in place names is pronounced [bɔk] or [bo]. The boscage form was used in English for leafy decoration such as is found on eighteenth-century porcelain. Similar words occur in Scandinavian (cf. Swedish buskage) and other Germanic languages; the original root is thought to be the proto-German "bosk". The boscage form seems to have developed its meaning under the influence of eighteenth-century romanticism.
The bocage form of the word came to English notice during the Second World War. It refers to a terrain of mixed woodland and pasture, with fields and winding country lanes sunken between narrow low ridges and banks surmounted by tall thick hedgerows that break the wind but also limit visibility. It is the sort of landscape found in England in Devon. In Normandy, it acquired a particular significance during the Battle of Normandy, as it made progress against the German defenders difficult. American personnel usually referred to bocage as "hedgerows".
Plot
Bocage is a former navy officer, a cultured gentleman, a passionate man, and a poet. He lived in the second half of the 18th century, and he goes through a number of relationships, writing love poems to his Three Graces: his colleague Márcia - a wild girl - and her two sisters, Anália, who loves God more than men, and Canária, a sensual Brazilean 'canary' who lives to love...
Keywords: 18th-century, character-name-in-title, eighteenth-century, lost-film, love-poem, native, sister-sister-relationship, sword