Judas biography
n. An autobiography that denigrates or betrays a former friend or spouse of the writer.
Examples
1999
There's a lot of that going around, of course, the mercenary airing of private affairs, the shameless peddling of what Updike calls "the Judas biography."
—Steve Duin, “Private memo to J.D., for his eyes only,” The Sunday Oregonian, May 16, 1999
1999
Recent years in America have given rise to what we might call the Judas biography, in which a former spouse or friend of a living writer confides to print an intimate portrait less flattering than might be expected.
—John Updike, “One Cheer for Literary Biography,” The New York Review of Books, February 04, 1999
1999 (earliest)
John Updike didn't coin the term 'Judas biography' (When revenge means a stab in the hardback, January 23); he adapted it from a remark of Oscar Wilde's: "Every great man nowadays has his disciples, and it is always Judas who writes the biography."
—Ron Brown, “Letter: 'Judas biography',” The Guardian (London), January 27, 1999
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