BNG Literature Award
The BNG Literature Award is a lifetime achievement award presented annually to Dutch-language writers and recognizes literary talent. The prize is presented to authors with a promising future in Dutch-language literature.
The BNG Literature Award is a lifetime achievement award presented annually to Dutch-language writers and recognizes literary talent. The prize is presented to authors with a promising future in Dutch-language literature.
With this award, the BNG Cultuurfonds aims to encourage literary talent and acknowledge authors with a promising future in Dutch literature.
Each year, a professional jury selects three or four books from all submissions for the shortlist. The award ceremony takes place around February. The winner receives a glass sculpture by Emmy van de Grift and €20,000.
In addition, there is a readers’ jury, consisting of BNG employees, who read the books selected by the professional jury and also choose a winner. This winner likewise receives a glass sculpture by Emmy van de Grift and a one‑month stay at the Roland Holst House in Bergen, which is managed by the Dutch Foundation for Literature.
De Inktaap is the leading literary youth award in the Netherlands. Senior secondary school pupils read three books and discuss them in reading groups at school. In a creative jury report, they share their judgement and explain which book they believe should win De Inktaap.
The books are chosen from the nominated titles for the BNG Literature Prize, the Boekenbon Literature Prize, and the Libris Literature Prize.
From 2025 onward, the submitted books will be donated annually to one or more schools participating in De Inktaap.
The BNG Cultuurfonds aims to inspire young people to read, and De Inktaap makes an important contribution to this goal.
The book must meet the following requirements:
The submission period will be announced shortly.
Joke van Vliet has won the BNG Literature Prize 2025 with her book Niets is echt gebeurd (“Nothing Really Happened”). The prize was awarded on 26 February by jury chair Pieter Jeroense in the Amstelkerk in Amsterdam. The jury describes the book as “a stylistically gifted, psychologically layered and assured novel in which the tension is steadily heightened.”
Van Vliet is the 21st winner of this prestigious award, but the first without the former age limit. As the jury beautifully put it, this change reflects that “age discrimination simply no longer fits our time. Writers often debut at a later age, meaning their literary careers also begin later.”
Niets is echt gebeurd takes us, together with the blind artist Daan den Dolen, into the darkness. Daan has withdrawn into her apartment and lives with the conviction that she could be arrested at any moment. With great precision, Van Vliet sketches her world, in which Daan wanders through both the rooms and her memories. “Remembering is looking back through a magnifying glass,” she muses, “certain moments highlighted and studied closely, while other parts remain unseen.” Seeing or not seeing becomes a key theme. What happened to her mother, her father? What happened to the Child?
In this novel, Van Vliet builds on the themes from her 2022 story collection Wanneer de herten komen (“When the Deer Come”). This collection was praised for its whimsical, almost surreal imagery, shortlisted for the J.M.A. Biesheuvel Prize, and named “the best debut of the year” by Trouw.
The jury consisted of:
The readers’ jury selected Coco Schrijber, with her book Het gezoem van bijna alles (“The Buzzing of Almost Everything”), as this year’s winner.
During the award ceremony, Floris de Jonge, chair of the readers’ jury, said:
“The book that moved us the most is a story that fits our times. With gripping storylines, unexpected twists, and suspense right up to the end. A book that makes the contemporary search for meaning tangible, and challenges us to reflect on the choices we make in our own lives.”
The BNG Culture Fund supports the arts and culture sector in the Netherlands. Read more about what the fund does.
For questions about the BNG Culture Fund, please contact:
Ana Buzón
Secretary of the BNG Culture Fund
