I confess that when I picked up this book, I thought it was just another story about the Brazilian underworld, as Jorge Amado usually does. But what I found was a distorted and mocking mirror of the Brazilian intellectual elite, naked under the harsh light of irony. It is a slap in the face with lace gloves. And also with a nightgown, perhaps worn, perhaps stained, perhaps too intimate. Jorge does not forgive. He writes with the smile of someone who has seen too much, has been inside, has worn the uniform and realized that behind it, often, there is only vanity and a profound mediocrity disguised as erudition. The protagonist, Professor Silvestre, is pathetic. And for that very reason, he is real. There is no heroism or greatness; there is a thirst for status, flattery, and the eternal theater of public reputation in conflict with private desires. Does a sex scandal threaten his career? Of course it does. But not because of ethics, but because of the fear of losing his position, his glory, his image. The book is short, but fierce. Each chapter is a jab at these gentlemen in suits and flowery speeches who, deep down, tremble with fear of being forgotten. I laughed. I laughed at other people's tragedies because they are, in some way, ours. They are present in academia, in politics, on social media, in the culture of appearances and even here on the website. It is not Jorge Amado's most poetic book. It is, perhaps, the most cynical. The most lucid. The most ruthless. And, for that very reason, it is so current, present and necessary.