The following was produced in conjunction with the public broadcasting system,
thanks to a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts and the support of viewers like you.
Good evening. My name is Henry Pender Oates and you're watching Diamonds in the Rough.
Tonight we shine our spotlight on yet another forgotten talent. Little is known about the
young author called Kenny, but perhaps that is because he let his work speak for itself.
Allegedly, the bulk of his fiction was composed orally at the age of four and transcribed by his
mother under the guise of research for her master's thesis on children's literacy acquisition.
Despite the author's young age, the work betrays a keen understanding of early surrealism and a
Hemingway-esque economy of language. So, without further ceremony, here is a collection of short
fiction by the author, dramatically interpreted by your humble host. As usual, I've also taken
the liberty of generating a few renderings that I primarily enhance the striking visuals described
by the pros. I give you, and then, dramatic interpretations of the work of Kenny by Henry
Pender Oates. The shrinking formula. Once upon a time, there was a boy named Billy,
who had a little fuzzy monster toy. One day, Billy and his toy monster decided to go outside to
play. All of the sudden, his monster began to grow. It grew six feet tall. The monster grew taller
than Billy, but when they played basketball, the monster would always win. Now, Billy did not like
this, so he had to look for a shrinking formula. Soon, he made one. When the monster wasn't looking,
Billy poured it on him. Then Billy was happy from that point on, and the monster never became big
again. The end. The witch that never came back. There was this witch. She was making a special
soup, and she put garlic, and then ice cubes, and then she put chocolate milk in it.
And then someone took over the castle, and then a trap went down, and it was Frankenstein.
But it was really a little boy. The end. A monster eating planet. Once there was a kid
who had a dinosaur, and then the dinosaur came into a robot, and then it came into a monster
eating planet. It was going bam, bam, bam, all over the ground and knocking down trees
and doing all that stuff. Then it kicked him right off his hot cycle onto the grass,
and then his dad had a new telescope that put everything back where it was, and dinosaurs
used to be dead. Then the dad put them back there, and then the monster was all gone. The end.
Simply splendid. What became of Kenny after the autumn of 1986, you might ask? The answer
is unclear. Certain devotees of his work contend that he tired of writing by age five, and made
a failed attempt at community service, building shelter for the homeless using toothpicks and
mini marshmallows. Others say his art drove him to drink by age eight, and he passed away
at the young age of eleven after an altercation with a Cambodian boy at an underground skipit
tournament. Yet others still believe he is alive and well, favoring private life over the ceaseless
scrutiny of celebrity. Wherever he may be, I say to him, bravo sir, bravo. For Diamonds in the Ruff,
I'm Henry Penderotes. Good evening.
