Loas (Drama)
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- Work cat.: 2006383902: Entremeses, loas y coloquios de Potosí, 2005.
- The Oxford companion to Spanish literature, 1978(Loa started out as a religious prologue that evolved into a movement that spread out to secular drama in the form of short plays; known for lavishing praise on a wide variety of subjects; originally monologues, they developed into miniature plays to interest early arrivals; [lists of several prominent Spaniard authors])
- Enc. univ. ilus., 1929(Loa was a dramatic prologue commonly used in classic Spanish drama that would take on the form of dramatic poetry)
- Cambridge history of Latin American literature, 1996:(The loa was a genre of the theatre that embraced both secular and religious themes in colonial Spanish America. While most loas preceded full-length plays by colonial, or more frequently, Peninsular playwrights, they rarely by the eighteenth century, served merely as an introduction to the larger piece. Rather, they were independent works of a panegyric nature: [lists authors from Peru, Colombia, Ecuador, Argentina, and Mexico])
A loa is a short theatrical piece, a prologue, written to introduce plays of the Spanish Golden Age or Siglo de Oro during the 16th and 17th centuries. These plays included comedias (secular plays) and autos sacramentales (sacred/religious plays). The main purposes for the loa included initially capturing the interest of the audience, pleading for their attention throughout the play, and setting the mood for the rest of the performance. This Spanish prologue is specifically characterized by praise and laudatory language for various people and places, often the royal court for example, to introduce the full-length play. The loa was also popular with Latin American or "New World" playwrights during the 17th and 18th centuries through Spanish colonization.
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