Here-in lies the problem for me:

    select * { wd:Q9682 (wdt:P25|wdt:P22)* ?p . ?p wdt:P25|wdt:P22 ?q } -

I am extremely motivated to learn how to use this: I have a deep desire to extract data from Wikipedia, and I'm fascinated by graph databases.

And yet, despite trying on several previous occasions, SPARQL has completely failed to stick in my brain.

This is partly my own failing: I'm confident that if I really dedicated myself to it I could get over this hump.

But it's also a sign that the learning curve here really is tremendously steep, which I think indicates a problem with the design of the technology.

Or use something like https://github.com/zverok/wikipedia_ql that uses Mediawiki API