The name ‘Jason Bourne’ was inspired by the story of a man called Ansel Bourne, a sufferer of dissociative fugue. Ansel woke up one day and didn’t know who he was, so decided to move to Pennsylvania and began working as a stationer under the name A.J Brown. Several months later he remembered he was indeed Ansel Bourne but, in turn, had no recollection of his time as A.J Brown.

His story was extensively recorded and studied by the Society of Psychical Research.