About The Book

“If equal affection cannot be
Let the more loving one be me.”
—W.H. Auden

Oscar Wilde’s relationship with Lord Alfred Douglas has inspired contemporary writers for decades. In his heartbreaking account of love tested to destruction, David Hare presents his powerful interpretation of what may have happened behind closed doors between Wilde and Douglas.

The Judas Kiss lays bare the drama of two critical moments in Wilde’s last years: the day he decides to stay in England and face imprisonment, and the night after his release, two years later, when the lover for whom he risked and lost everything betrays him.

With a quiet but burning sense of outrage, The Judas Kiss presents the consequences of taking an uncompromisingly moral position in a world defined by fear, expedience, and conformity.