It Rhymes with Lust

AUTHOR: Waller, Drake (pseudonym of Arnold Drake and Leslie Waller)

ARTIST: Matt Baker (illustrator); Ray Osrin (inker and letterer)

PUBLISHER: Dark Horse Comics

FIRST BOOK PUBLICATION: 1950

Publication History

Originally published in 1950 as the first of a proposed series of what St. John Publications called “picture novels,” It Rhymes with Lust, written by Arnold Drake and Leslie Waller (as Drake Waller), was part of a short-lived experiment in creating a mature comic book series for adults, using a small paperback format. As such, it is seen by some as the first graphic novel, particularly as it combined text and images in a way that precursors of the form had not. The book remained out of print for many years, making it a valuable rarity that commanded a high price in The Overstreet Comic Book Price Guide. As interest in the graphic novel and its development grew, the book was reprinted by Dark Horse Comics in 2007, in a close facsimile edition with short biographies of Drake, Waller, and illustrator Matt Baker and an afterword by Drake.

Plot

The story opens with reporter Hal Weber returning to his hometown, Copper City, at the behest of an old flame, Rust Masson. He arrives to find Rust attending the funeral of her husband, Buck Masson, a rich businessman and boss of the local political machine. Rust offers Hal the job of editing a local newspaper, The Express, which she secretly owns and plans to use to discredit Marcus Jeffers, who hopes to inherit Buck Masson’s empire. Almost immediately, Marcus Jeffers tries to persuade Hal to double-cross Rust.

Hal then goes on a date with Rust’s attractive stepdaughter, Audrey Masson, to the expensive Club Gaucho; there is a strong attraction between them. She warns Hal about Rust, but Hal continues to do Rust’s bidding; despite some reservations, he searches for dirt on Jeffers. He meets Audrey again, and she continues to make him feel guilty, especially when they talk about Hal’s father, an honest newspaper man.

Hal receives a tip that Jeffers runs an illegal gambling den, and when he passes this information to Rust, she assures him that she will arrange for the place to be raided. Instead, she arranges for her hired thug, Monk Shirl, to bomb the gambling den. Aware of who has destroyed his club, Jeffers confronts Rust, but she reveals that she has incriminating evidence that she can use to blackmail him.

Meanwhile, Hal refuses to believe that Rust had anything to do with the bombing. (An innocent paperboy is killed in the blast.) Jake, his assistant at The Express, persuades him to suspect Rust. Hal is taken to Masson’s mines by Pop, the local taxi driver; when they are nearly killed in a cave-in, he has evidence against Rust that he can print in his newspaper. However, when he confronts her, the combination of her denial and her sexual allure persuades him he is wrong.

Audrey witnesses this, and, after Hal leaves, she confronts Rust, who slaps her in the face. Later, seeing Audrey’s injuries, Hal takes her back to confront Rust. They arrive just in time to see Monk Shirl and another thug, Tiny, killing Marcus Jeffers. In perhaps the most implausible twist in the plot, Hal not only fails to stop the killing, thereby driving Audrey away, but he also agrees to help Tiny dump the body.

Alone in his apartment, Hal confronts his own weakness, not only for Rust but also for alcohol. With a bottle of liquor in one hand and Audrey’s glove in the other, he makes a choice and smashes the bottle against the wall. He returns to the newspaper office and begins to write a full exposé. Hal arranges for the newspapers to be delivered. Meanwhile, a badly injured Marcus Jeffers has survived and hitches a ride on a truck.

While Jeffers plans his revenge, Rust is woken by Monk Shirl who is holding a copy of the Express newspaper. She discovers that her former allies are beginning to desert her. She then has to employ Monk and his thugs to help her confront the miners who are refusing to work. In a confrontation at the mine, Rust and Monk mount one of the automated mine buckets to address the miners. At this point, Jeffers arrives, and, as he hears Rust blaming him for all the previous events, he switches the power, putting the bucket in motion. Monk shoots Jeffers, but the bucket tips Rust and Monk, and all three die. The novel finishes with a conventional happy ending: Audrey forgives Hal and they appear to settle down to domestic bliss.

Characters

•Rust Masson is prepared to use violence to achieve her aims, whether directly or indirectly. Judging by the color cover, Rust’s name derives from her hair, which is red and is cut in a short, assertive style. As drawn by Baker, she has all the attributes of an attractive but deadly femme fatale.

•Hal Weber is an archetypal American alpha-male hero, but his weakness is clearly women, particularly the manipulative Rust. He is tortured by his guilt for much of the novel and is unable to escape the wiles of Rust.

•Audrey Masson is the daughter of Buck Masson’s first marriage and is at loggerheads with her stepmother, whom she knows married her father only for his money and power. She has long flowing hair and is the more traditionally feminine counterpart to the assertive Rust.

•Monk Shirl is Rust’s main thug who is prepared to follow her orders to the letter. He would like to be more than just her hired gun, but Rust resists his advances.

•Marcus Jeffers is an obese, corrupt businessman who is less under the influence of Rust than others but is driven by the desire for power.

Artistic Style

Baker, an African American illustrator, a rarity in mainstream comics during the 1950’s, is best known for drawing comics with beautiful heroines, a genre known as “Good Girl Art.” His most famous characters were the leads in Sheena, Queen of the Jungle and Phantom Lady; the pneumatic figure of the latter was cited by Frederic Wertham in his 1954 book The Seduction of the Innocent as having a detrimental effect on the nation’s youth. The two main female characters in the book, Rust and Audrey, are drawn in Baker’s usual style, both rendered as beautiful and sensual, with the shapely figures that were fashionable in the 1950’s.

It Rhymes with Lust is drawn in the bold style typical of many mainstream comics of the period, with strong brush-inked lines and solid blacks. Baker is more comfortable with figures, and his landscapes and street scenes are perhaps less convincing, hampered by the small scale of the book and the fact that most pages have three or four panels.

Full-page panels are used for dramatic effect, such as the bombing scene and the deaths of Rust and Monk. Baker is more confident with interiors, and the artwork uses detailed tone effects that allow various shades of gray to be introduced where necessary. This technique is used to great effect on some interior scenes, creating depth and atmosphere. For example, Hal is shown sitting in an office that is almost entirely rendered in tone with no line artwork, giving the room a gray, bleak feeling. Elsewhere, this effect is used to create a sense of depth, with either figures or backgrounds atmospherically rendered entirely in tone.

Themes

As suggested by the title, the book’s central theme is lust, both in a sexual context and also in terms of lust for power. The themes of the book are typical of those in “hard-boiled” detective fiction and film noir popular in the United States in the 1930’s and 1940’s. The story deals with a central, sexual relationship between two people set in an evil, crime-ridden world.

The plot is driven by Rust Masson, the femme fatale. She is a typical femme fatale, in that she is prepared to achieve her aims by any means necessary, including murder; in particular, she will use her sexual charms to control the men she meets. This archetype has attracted criticism from feminist writers, who see the femme fatale as a strong, sexualized woman who is punished for these characteristics by a patriarchal society. This punishment is usually extreme and, as in the case of Rust Masson, often ends in the death of the character.

Meanwhile, the central male character, Hal Webber, is initially in the thrall of Rust, and the events that unfold are largely out of his control. This is typical of film noir, in that the evil events that happen are not caused by the hero or victim but happen for no good reason.

The sexual nature of the relationship between Rust and Hal is clear, but even though the book is aimed at adults, the extent of their affair is not shown overtly. They are shown in a torrid, virtually horizontal kiss, for example, taking up the whole of the page, but on the next page, they are shown talking, with Hal in his shirtsleeves and a glass in his hand. The shift in time and space is subtle but can be read as the equivalent of the “fade” used in films of the time and that implied sexual activity that the censor would not allow to be shown. Hal in particular deals with the tension between integrity and lustful and financial temptation.

Impact

The book and the following picture novel, The Case of the Winking Buddha (1950), were not commercially successful. Low sales meant that the experimental series was stopped after those two titles. The time may have not been right for the acceptance of a graphic novel, even in a paperback book format. A similar attempt was made in 1950 by Gold Key Comics, but its title, Mansion of Evil, by Joseph Millard, was also a failure even though it used interior color. Had any of these books been successful, they might have changed the history of the form, spawning a range of imitators. The picture books’ impact was therefore limited, other than perhaps discouraging other publishers from undertaking similar experiments. Nevertheless, the picture books can be seen as an attempt, allied with the experiments of EC Comics and others, to produce more sophisticated and adult comics in the decade after World War II.

Further Reading

Kane, Gil. His Name Is . . . Savage! (1968).

Millard, Joseph. Mansion of Evil (1950).

Stokes, Manning Lee, and Charles Raab. The Case of the Winking Buddha (1950).

Bibliography

Gilbert, Michael T., and Ken Quattro. “It Rhymes with Lust.” The Comics Journal 277 (July, 2006): 78.

Jourdain, Bill. “Comics’ First Great African American Artist.” Golden Age of Comic Books, June 17, 2009. http://goldenagecomics.org/wordpress/2009/06/17/comics-then-5-comics-first-great-african-american-artist.

Stout, Tim. “It Rhymes with Lust Story Structure.” Tim Stout. http://timstout.wordpress.com/story-structure/it-rhymes-with-lust-story-structure.