This year’s Edinburgh Fringe programme has been launched with the usual salvo of words and warnings.

As ever there is cause for reflection on everything from the Fringe Society’s bullish (or is that foolish?) defence of its Baillie Gifford sponsorship to the cost of (and legislation around) accommodation in the capital. On that second subject, there is a rabbit hole marked ‘exemptions to short-term lets licenses’ but I don’t recommend you dive down it. I did, and I’ve only just found my way back from a very chewy subreddit.

No, better by far to just open the Fringe programme and dive into that instead. One of the pleasures of doing so has always been identifying the zeitgeisty themes the dramatists, skit-makers and comics have picked up on since they last headed north to do battle with the Edinburgh weather. Barbie, Big Brother, Brexit – that sort of thing.

These days the Fringe website does some of the work for you, to which end the data ninjas at Fringe HQ have this year highlighted an array of hot topics. Among them are AI (which will soon dispense with the need for data ninjas), capitalism (always a sexy subject), the female experience (I think that’s code for something, right JK?) and, last but not least, mental health, which will necessarily see some performers open up about trauma and walk that fine line between the genuinely therapeutic and the potentially damaging. But all in the pursuit of art, of course. And maybe........

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