Bentham’s wills reveal lifelong plans for auto-icon
Forthcoming research from UCL's Bentham Project on wills made by philosopher and UCL spiritual founder Jeremy Bentham shows his wish to leave his remains to benefit medical science was refined over decades, and not the last whim of an eccentric Englishman. Bentham's 'auto-icon' (from the Greek for self-image or likeness) sits in a showcase in the award-winning Student Centre at UCL, dressed in his clothes and holding his favourite walking stick known as 'Dapple'. It's long been UCL's most popular museum exhibit, attracting visitors from all over the world. A sneak preview of ongoing work by Dr Tim Causer (Bentham Project, UCL Laws) on Bentham's wills, as well as his unpublished pamphlet on the benefit of auto-icons, reveals insights into the mind of a man who would have had a lot to say about contemporary issues too, including memorialisation and the debate over who should and should not be honoured with a statue. Dr Causer's research comes in the week of what would have been Jeremy Bentham's 273rd birthday (15 February). He is editing Bentham's wills and 'Farther Uses of the Dead to the Living' for The Collected Works of Jeremy Bentham , tentatively planned for publication next year, which will make them available in one volume with detailed historical and contextual annotation. Dr Causer said: "It's clear that Bentham had, from at least the age of 21, thought about how he might benefit humankind after his death by donating his body to science for dissection.
