Good morning. Did you read something this week that you really enjoyed? We’d love to hear about it – send us an email.
If you’re still after something to peruse, here are some stories that caught my eye around the Guardian in the last few days.
Have a lovely weekend. I’ll meet you at the fake Rembrandts workshop (where they will not be producing fake Birkenstocks – evidently they are not art).
1. Europe’s turning point
It’s been a week since US vice-president JD Vance’s speech at the Munich Security Conference stunned European leaders with its implications for the Europe-US relationship. In Trump time, years! The updates on his second presidency just keep coming (see: Ukraine), and it’s hard to find breathing room to think about the actual shifts taking place.
But Nathalie Tocci, Yanis Varoufakis, Rokhaya Diallo, Shada Islam, John Kampfner and Lorenzo Marsili ponder the question: if Trump and Vance have smashed the old order, how should Europe respond?
How long will it take to read: about eight minutes.
Further reading: Whatever your views on the importance of a transatlantic alliance, its collapse is momentous – Patrick Wintour’s analysis last week of Vance’s speech laid out why.
2. The nuance of Khaled Sabsabi’s art
It’s also been about a week since Creative Australiacontroversially dumped artist Khaled Sabsabi as the 2026 representative for the Venice Biennale after negative coverage in The Australian newspaper about his historical artwork, which was subsequently raised by a Liberal senator in Senate question time. It sparked, as Walter Marsh explores, “a media and political storm that has upturned Australia’s art world”.
Is depicting something the same thing as glorifying it? What about irony? What about complexity? What about … art?
How long will it take to read: at least five minutes.
Further reading: Debate around artistic freedom in Australia is (often) a cramped, neurotic mess. Relatedly, the Guardian confirmed this week that two Palestinian flags in a tapestry were covered up in a major exhibition at the National Gallery.
3. Murder and mandolins
Jean-Claude Vannier, now in his early 80s, has been a disruptive presence in French pop for 60 years. Guardian music critic Alexis Petridis, always good to read, goes deep with the great musical “disruptor”, who has worked with Serge Gainsbourg and influenced everyone from Beck to De La Soul to Portishead.
He “doesn’t give much outward impression of slowing down,” Petridis writes. “Perhaps he can’t stop.”
***
“All the great love stories are sad, because if people live happily ever after and have lots of children, there’s not much to say.” – Jean-Claude Vannier
In the room: “Ask a set designer to create a bohemian Paris apartment and they’ll probably come up with something that looks a lot like [his]: books everywhere, vintage Bauhaus armchairs, art on every bit of wall space.”
How long will it take to read: less than four minutes.
4. When parental exhaustion tips into burnout
Imagine a job you could never quit. (I don’t have children, but I have just started watching Severance.) While there are many other (lovelier) ways to look at parenthood, the truth is many people with small children are worn out – and for some, the pressure of striving to be perfect gets too much. Speaking to a range of experts and very honest parents – including Rachel Stern, pictured above – Deborah Linton explores the tricky realities of parental burnout.
What is parental burnout? Academics define it as “chronic and overwhelming stress which leads parents to feel exhausted and run down by their role” – at its worst, it can be more likely to give rise to thoughts of suicide, researchers say, than cases of job burnout or depression.
What causes it? Experts point to a gap between resources (family or peer support, health and finances) and the level of demands (number of children, presence, support and relationship with a co-parent, and expectations). Researchers say it’s most prevalent in individualistic societies – such as Poland, Belgium, the US and Canada – where a high value is placed on personal achievement, perfectionism and self-reliance.
How long will it take to read: about six minutes.
• In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14.
5. A spooky and magnificent worm
This is quite a short story about a newly feted bug. But Eva Corlett has made it a tale of marvel. What is it that most grabbed me about this velvet worm (a technical term!), this “living fossil”?
Its “rows of pudgy legs and skin speckled like a galaxy”? Its “ancient lineage”? Its “dark secret” – a “vicious hunting method” where it shoots sticky goo out from its head, dissolving its prey into a soup and “slurping it up”?
All the above. When the sky is full of asteroid and Musk satellites, it’s time to look to the ground for good news. (And not time to talk about microplastics – please, just give me this.)
How long will it take to read: under two minutes.
Further reading: Nature is weird and full of wonders. Have you heard of cleaner fish? They clean other fish – with some happy fish clients going back for an extra polish up to 144 times a day. How nice.
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