A book club built for two
Just what is Stephen Harper reading?
Dominique Jarry-Shore
Back in April 2007, Yann Martel began mailing the prime minister a book and a letter every second Monday. Though the initial media attention has faded, a year and a half later Martel is still at it, sending everything from English Lit staples (To The Lighthouse) to more esoteric selections (Gilgamesh) in a bid to create a dialogue with the prime minister about the importance of the arts.
But if the goal of the prize-winning author's "guerrilla book club" is to create a dialogue, so far the conversation has been one-sided. Martel has received only a single curt reply from Harper's assistant. "In a sense, his silence is an answer," Martel says. "I mean, I'm just one writer. He's obviously not losing sleep over this."
Harper may not be losing sleep, but he did lose votes in the last federal election-most notably in Quebec-over his controversial cuts to arts and culture. Martel said he thought the protest to the cuts was "fantastic" but fears Harper's approach to the arts will be the same this time around.
Harper's election win last October renewed Martel's job in the immediate term, although a coalition government could mess with the plan. "I made a promise with myself to continue this for as long as Stephen Harper is prime minister," Martel says. Far from insulting the Prime Minister (as some critics have charged), Martel sees his book club as a way of gently "goading" him: "Where do you get the dreams that you have for Canada? I'm asking questions that I could ask anyone."
