What is Stephen Harper Reading?

This is an excert from one of the letters that Yan Martel wrote to Stephen Harper on his site:
What is Stephen Harper Reading

"So, self-knowledge—must I write?—is useful not only in writing but in living. And solitude bears fruit not only for the one who aspires to write poetry but for anyone who aspires to anything. Whereas, to take a counter-example, I thinks it’s rare that advice to do with commerce has much use beyond commerce. Our deepest way of examining life, of getting to our existential core, is through the artistic. At its best, such an examination has nearly a religious feel."

~Yann Martel