At Logos College in West Texas, huge young men, vacuum-packed
into shoulder pads and shiny helmets, play football with intense
passion. During an uncharacteristic winning season, the perplexed
and distracted running back Gary Harkness has periodic fits of
nuclear glee; he is fueled and shielded by his fear of and
fascination with nuclear conflict. Among oddly afflicted and
recognizable players, the terminologies of football and nuclear
war--the language of end zones--become interchangeable, and their
meaning deteriorates as the collegiate year runs its course. In
this triumphantly funny, deeply searching novel, Don DeLillo
explores the metaphor of football as war with rich, original
zeal.
