The Book Prize Index

Murder in Amsterdam: The Death of Theo Van Gogh and the Limits of Tolerance

Ian Buruma

On a cold November day in Amsterdam, an angry young Muslim man, the son of Moroccan immigrants, killed celebrated and controversial Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh, great-grandnephew of Vincent and iconic European provocateur, for making a movie that "blasphemed" Islam. The murder horrified quiet, complacent, prosperous Holland, a country that prides itself on being a bastion of tolerance, and sent shock waves across Europe and around the world. Ian Buruma returned to his native Netherlands to try to make sense of it all and to see what larger meaning should and shouldn't be drawn from this story.

True Crime & JusticeTrue Crime & Justice · medium confidenceTrue Crime & Justice81 signalsLlm Classifier: True Crime & Justice -> True Crime & JusticeTopic Classifier: Literary Biography -> BiographyKeyword Classifier: Race & Ethnicity -> Race & EthnicityLiterary BiographyLiterature & WritersDeath, Memory & Commemoration

Award History

1 wins · 2 total

AwardYearResultCategory / Notes
Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Current InterestMajor2006WinnerSecondary source
Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-FictionMajor2007FinalistSecondary source
View all award history (2)
Experimental book profileGenerated by GPT-5.4 nano · may contain inaccuracies

This is an unverified interpretation of the catalog description, offered as an opt-in discovery experiment—not as bibliographic fact.

  1. 01 Central figures

    • Theo van Gogh90%

  2. 02 Central places

    • Amsterdam85%
    Show lower-confidence suggestions

    These suggestions did not meet the normal display threshold and are more likely to be wrong.

    • Holland45%

  3. 03 Suggested argument

    No argument inferred with sufficient confidence.

  4. 04 Reading orientation

    35 / 100 academic

    Serious trade

    An estimate of intended readership and scholarly apparatus—not quality or importance.

Confidence percentages are the model's own estimates. Profile confidence: 78%.