Eulogy

Hello, my name is John Krystal. I am the chair of the Yale Psychiatry Department and I have the sad task of saying goodbye, on behalf of the Department of Psychiatry and Yale University, to a man that I have known for 34 years as a teacher, scholar, healer, colleague, and friend.

Ethel, Susan, David, and Judi, please accept our deepest condolences.

Sid was an outspoken advocate for psychology and he had a huge impact on our Department. After obtaining his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago in 1957 and completing an internship with the noted psychologist, Carl Rogers, he came to Yale in 1960 and was recruited to the faculty of the Department of Psychiatry in 1963. He completed psychoanalytic training at the Western New England Psychoanalytic Institute, where he remained connected throughout his career.

For nearly 50 years, Sid led the Section of Psychology of our Department, consisting of nearly half of the 175 full-time and 400 voluntary faculty members. In this role he set high standards for clinical and academic excellence, trained generations of future leaders of psychology and psychiatry, including 40 PhD students and current Yale President Dr. Peter Salovey, and he helped to make Yale one of the world’s leading Psychiatry Departments.

What wonderful gifts Sid gave to us. Over 220 articles and 17 books, Sid wrote about the nature of the human psyche and the factors that shape our sense of our selves in relation to the people to whom we are closest.

Sid was a polymath, his writing drew on psychology, psychoanalysis, sociology, anthropology, neurobiology, genetics, developmental biology, cognitive neuroscience, and art. Sid was a scientist who brought rigorous research methods to psychoanalysis, both provoking and inspiring this field to test its most precious hypotheses.

Sid received numerous honors, too many to list today. He received the highest awards from several organizations including the American Psychological Association and American Psychoanalytic Associatio