Poetic Licenses : Car culture: Vanity plates are perfect for all kinds of short, snappy messages. But Daniel Nussbaum uses them to spell out his own versions of Oedipus and ‘A Streetcar Named Desire.’

It’s sort of like Shakespeare doing 15 to 20 at Folsom Prison, forced to compose literary classics using nothing but license plates.

Daniel Nussbaum isn’t in jail, but he takes famous literature--everything from “A Tale of Two Cities” to “The Joy of Sex”--and rewrites it with words from personalized license plates.

It’s literally poetry in motion.

“IAMMMMM PL8 MMMAN, HEARME ROARRR,” says the 43-year-old Silver Lake resident, communicating in platese.

His vocabulary comes from three thick volumes listing the 1.1 million vanity plates registered in the Golden State. With the lists, he has written abbreviated versions of movies, novels, even portions of the Old Testament. No license plate is used more than once per story.

Nussbaum likes to think of it as a new literary genre, comparable to haiku or the sonnet: “All the plates in California are like some vast poem which nobody understands and nobody sees. . . . My task is to pull out pieces of the poem.”

So far, his compositions have appeared in Harper’s Magazine and Playboy, but Nussbaum has a grander vision.

First, a book of his stories (his agent is searching for a publisher), then a gathering at the Rose Bowl of the 154 drivers whose vanity plates spell out his version of Oedipus. After organizing the cars in the parking lot, “we can all pull onto the freeway, convoy style, and roll Oedipus into Las Vegas,” he says.

He also muses over the possibility of license-plate political campaigns (RDMYLPS NONUTXS. HAHA ILIED), newspapers (LATIMES, CLSIFYD, CALENDR) and tombstones (IMDEAD)--all based on existing California plates.

“I feel like I’m working in a new dialect or subdialect of English,” Nussbaum says.

He stumbled upon license-speak three years ago while standing in one of those interminable lines at the Department of Motor Vehicles. A transplanted New Yorker, Nussbaum started thumbing through a printout of personalized plates and grew transfixed by the wacky spellings and diversity of messages: “On an intellectual level, I think the sudden appearance of language in concrete form--in metal--on our cars . . . is fascinating.”

Later, he bought his own set of license directories and has become something of a vanity plate scholar, although often with tongue in cheek. (Nussbaum’s day job is free-lance humor writer and movie-location scout.)

“I feel like these are the holy texts and I’ve been studying them,” he says. “It’s in my genes.”

The metal messages, he adds, offer sociological insights (“We have IMAKID but no ADULT or GROWNUP plates”), as well as clues to morals (NOETHCS, GODSAVZ), likes and dislikes (LVMYDOG, IH8SMOG), politics (GOPDUDE) and emotional states (IHURT, BORNLZR). There are sexual innuendoes (N2SHEEP), jokes (NOBRAIX), questions (RUMYDAD), scientific equations (EISMC2), bodily fluids (PHLEGM), even anti-plate plates (IH8PL8S).

Each day, the DMV receives about 500 requests for vanity licenses. If the message clears department censors, it is forwarded to Folsom Prison and stamped into metal by inmates. In 1970, when personalized plates were introduced, only a few thousand people applied. Within a few years, however, the number of requests exploded and hasn’t let up.

“There’s this cultural urge to say something personal about yourself to total strangers,” Nussbaum says. “It may be another facet of what we see on ‘Oprah’ or ‘Geraldo.’ ”

But something cosmic also is at work, says Nussbaum’s friend Liz Albrecht of Brooklyn: “The people of California are engaged in a great work of genius without even knowing it. . . . They think they’re acting out of vanity, but actually . . . they’ve tapped into some kind of Jungian collective unconscious and are inadvertently contributing pieces to a (literary) mosaic.”

If so, Nussbaum might be the only person trying to make sense of it all. DMV spokesman Quin Quinliven says he knows of no other authors who use vanity plates as their medium: “That’s a new one.”

Indeed, Nussbaum has become so absorbed in license lingo that he even uses it to write grocery lists (2M8OS, POT8OS).

But he insists that his penchant for plates is more of a game than an obsession: “I do it because it’s fun. . . . It’s a challenge.”

Perhaps too much of a challenge at times.

“Most plates, for my purposes, are not useful at all,” he says. “They have Debbie spelled 400,000 ways or they have IMPAUL. . . . I encourage people to get plates with adverbs. I don’t have enough adverbs.”

Occasionally, however, license plates with people’s names prove useful. STELAAA, for example, inspired a Nussbaum version of “A Streetcar Named Desire.” Once he decides which story to retell, it usually takes a few days or weeks to put it together.

For readers, the shortage of usable words and curious spellings can make some of the pieces difficult to read, especially because Nussbaum often deliberately chooses unusual or harder-to-decipher plates.

But he suggests that plate patter might be the language of the future:

“Literacy has changed to the point where most people don’t read. . . . We’re communicating with each other--at least on a mass scale--using bumper stickers, graffiti and license plates. . . . Someday, kids will be reading my books instead of Cliffs Notes.”

It stands to reason, then, that Mr. License Plate Person would have crafted the ultimate seven-character message for his own car. Right?

“Um, I don’t have a vanity plate,” Nussbaum confesses. “But if I’m writing a story someday and I really need a word, I’ll go out and buy one.”

All Is Vanity Plates An excerpt from Daniel Nussbaum’s version of Genesis, retold using personalized license plates registered with California’s Department of Motor Vehicles:

INTHE BEGINNG DYD GODCRE8 HEAVEN PLUS EARTH. THE HLYSPRT CRUZD ONE TOTALEE VOID MONDO DARKNIS. THENN GODSAYD, “LET THERR BELITE.” THERE WUZ LITE. THELITE IS CALLED DAY, THEDARK IZZ NIGHTT. GODZRAD. HESED, “XCLNT, FERSUR.” DAYONE.

GODKEPT SUPER BUZEE 4DAYZ. BY WEEKND, GODMADE ALLOFIT. DRIZZLE. FIJI. BUGGZ. UNAMEIT. ZWORX. FINALI GODGAVE DAWOILD HUMAN BEINGS IN HISOWN IMAGE.

“HERETIZ, MYWURLD. ITZ4U,” SAID GODD. “MULTIPLY. TAKEOVR. DOITALL.” THEN THELORD KCKDBAK. HEE TOOK ADAYOFF. DAE SEVEN.

ADAM ISONE LONEBOY INEDEN. “IWILL MAKE AFEMALE 4U2LUVV,” SEZ THEBIGG CRE8OR. SO HEE DUZ PULLLLL ARIB OUT2USE. DATSEVE.

“EATEAT,” GODDID TELLEM. “EATCORN, EATYAMS, EATNUTS. BUTNOO, DONTOCH FRUITS OFF THETREE YONDER. THATZ NOT4U. TRY1 AND YOUTWO EATDETH.”

“NOTRUE,” GOEZ DA SERPENT 2EVA. “UCANT DIE. GODKNOS YOU2CAN BELIKE HIMCELF: BRAINEE, WISE, KNOWING GOOD NEVIL. TRYIT. YBDULL?”

EVE ASKS ADAMM, “UWANNA?”

EVENADAM CHOWDWN THE TABOO SNACK. “YIIIKES!” THEY SAY. “LOOKITU! LOOKAME! GOGETA FIG LEAF!”

THISTYM GODIS NOT MELLLO. HE MAKES SERIUSZ CHANGES. . . .