Bruno Destrée
Bruno Destrée (1867-1919) was a Benedictine monk, a French-language poet, and a Belgian literary critic. He was the brother of the politician Jules Destrée. Bruno Destrée was a monk at Maredsous Abbey and later at Keizersberg Abbey in Leuven. He was interested in the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. Biography. Georges Destrée was born in Marcinelle August 10, 1867. He was the younger brother of the politician Jules Destrée. Like his elder brother, he studied law at the Université Libre de Bruxelles. It was then he started putting his father's first name, Olivier, before his own. He  collaborated as an art columnist in the magazine "La Jeune Belgique", where he met Max Waller, Albert Giraud and Iwan Gilkin. Anglophile, he was really enthusiastic about Pre-Raphaelite painting: in 1894 he published "Les Préraphaélites : notes sur l’art décoratif et la peinture en Angleterre", the very first essay on this movement in French. In the "Revue général" of October 1895, he gave a nearly complete translation of "La Lampe de la mémoire", the sixth chapter of "The Seven Lamps of Architecture"; a few years later, Marcel Proust’s reading of that text would be decisive in his own business  of translating John Ruskin’s work. He then collaborated with the Catholic magazine "Durendal". He gradually got closer to Catholicism and decided in October 1898 to enter the Order of St. Benedict. He took the name of Dom Bruno and later left Maredsous abbey to enter Keizersberg Abbey in Leuven. He was ordained priest in 1903. In 1911, he collaborated with his brother to organise the exhibition "Les Arts anciens du Hainaut". He died of peritonitis on 30 October 1919 in Leuven.