The current issue of Physics Today has a beautiful obituary of Sidney Coleman, written by his longtime friend and collaborator Sheldon Glashow. The article is remarkable not only for its lively memories of physics “clown-prince” Sidney Coleman but also for having the best first sentence possible:
Cherished friend, colleague, and collaborator Sidney Richard Coleman, Donner Professor of Science at Harvard University, died on 18 November 2007 after a long struggle with Lewy body disease.
It’s illustrated by a snip from the photo above, a candid shot taken by Lubos Motl and donated by him to the Wikimedia Commons.
Shelley no doubt has more and funnier memories of Sidney than anyone else. Restraining myself from cherry-picking his essay, which I hope you’ll read, he quotes the tagline of Sidney’s 1962 thesis:
“What we do here is nothing to what we dream of doing.”
Sidney lifted that quote from Justine, by the Marquis de Sade.