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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/48067
License name: CC BY-SA 4.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/48067
License name: CC BY-SA 4.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

Your readers are not going to imagine what LILLAHI birds look like. At best, this sort of technique calls forth the impression of an exotic location from their memory. For a westerner, for instance, references to exotic birds, gems, and flowers, may call to minds old Hollywood movie scenes set in India or Arabia. And that may be entirely satisfactory to the reader.

Literature is not addressed to the senses, the way a movie is. It is addressed to the memory. It uses words to call feelings and images out of memory, and thus the effect it has on any given reader depends on what feelings and images they have in their memory to begin with. (This is why older and/or foreign works are often less accessible, because they try to call forth memories we don't have.)

So, if you want readers to call forth vaguely Arabian Nights images from their memories when they read your stuff, referring to LILLAHI birds etc will probably do the trick. But you don't need to keep calling up those images over and over again. Once they are there, the work is done and you should move on with the story. If you keep on doing it, it will quickly get distracting and annoying.

Original score: 8