Bulletin of the Psychoanalytic Research Society, Volume I, Number 1, Spring, 1992
Early last fall, Robert J. Stoller, M.D., psychoanalytic theorist and researcher and Professor of Psychiatry at the UCLA Medical School, died in a tragic traffic accident near his home in Pacific Palisades, California. He was 66. Dr. Stoller had an international reputation, stemming from his pioneering and courageous work on perversions, sexual excitement and identity issues. His conception of sexual fantasy as a device to heal childhood traumas was influential and evocative, both theoretically and clinically. This conception was developed in a series of books beginning in 1968 with Sex and Gender: On the Development of Masculinity and Femininity. He continued to creatively develop and expand his basic ideas in numerous research publications, and this year, two books were published: Pain and Passion: An Ethnography of Consensual Sado-masochism, and Porn: Myths for the Twenty-first Century.
For those who knew him, Bob was a person who exhibited a rare combination of intellect, insight, imagination and integrity, with a special sensitivity for people and the world around him. He was one of the charter members of the Psychoanalytic Research Society (one of the very few M.D.s). we will miss Robert Stoller and his contributions.
--Harold Cook, Ph.D.