Simsone Grisaldo

Simsone Grisaldo, a play (Schauspiel) in five acts published anonymously by F. M. Klinger in 1776. The eponymous hero is a man of great physical and moral strength, who bears his first name in allusion to the biblical Samson. Simsone, a general in the service of Castile, defeats the state's foreign enemies, first the Moors and then the Aragonese. His enemies at home conspire against him, seeking to exploit his weakness for women, and so to bind and blind him. Simsone, with the help of one of the women, Almerine, frustrates their machinations. The robust, manly, generous character of the hero is said to owe something to Goethe, whom Klinger greatly admired.