The protagonist of this novel is an intelligent and sensitive teenager who has to separate from his childhood friend and adapt to new classmates by leaving school and starting high school. From the first day of class you are expected to show what it is worth to get well rid of the inevitable distribution of roles on which your luck will depend during the course. And although he is determined to resist this rite as incomprehensible as painful, the small society formed by the students will end up imposing his portion of suffering, a wound that will last intact until adulthood. Behind the door, the fourth installment of La novela de Ferrara, is the moving story of a character torn apart by the conflict between the need to be accepted and the need to accept oneself. Through seemingly harmless feuds between students, Bassani lets glimpse, with his characteristic insight and subtlety, the disturbing background of fascist Italy, in which any hint of difference represented a betrayal.