In 1984, USAID and the CIA commissioned the University of Nebraska's Center for Afghanistan Studies to create textbooks for Afghan schoolchildren. The textbooks are filled with violent images and militant Islamic teachings -- talk of jihad and drawings of guns, bullets, soldiers, and mines – subtle, coercive propaganda meant to stimulate resistance against the U.S.S.R. HEARTLAND, commissioned by Interact Theatre, is inspired by these true events. In the play, Dr. Harold Banks is a renowned professor of Central Asian Literature at the University of Nebraska. When an Afghan refugee named Nazrullah suddenly arrives at his doorstep claiming to know his adopted daughter, Getee– an Afghan-American foreign aid worker who was killed in a Taliban attack–the two men spend the next few months as unlikely roommates. Heartland unfolds as an emotional journey through love and loss, an examination of culpability and, ultimately, a meditation on mercy.