In his work ­commonly called Discourse on the Method, French philosopher René Descartes searches for a source of incontrovertible truth. He methodically rejects anything that could potentially be doubted. Our senses, for instance, can be deceived; human reason is prone to error and thoughts might hold no more truth than dreams. However, he goes on to state, “...I observed that, whilst I thus wished to think that all was false, it was absolutely necessary that I, who thus thought, should be somewhat.” This line of thinking led Descartes to one of the foundational notions of Western ­philosophy:

Cogito ergo sum. I think, therefore I am.

In other words, the very act of doubting proves the existence of someone to do the doubting. Thought alone is enough to establish the existence of the self. On a philosophical level, Descartes’s dictum might be satisfying, but on a personal level, is this really enough? While existence provides a helpful starting place, the search for individual identity seems to demand something more. What if instead of just thinking, I need to remember?

Vladimir Nabokov, author of Lolita, seems to endorse this line of thinking in his autobiography Speak, Memory. As the title implies, Nabokov’s autobiography draws heavily on his memories, and from the beginning, points to the act of remembrance as the way an individual can set himself apart from the rest of the universe. At the very beginning of the book, Nabokov describes existence as “a brief crack of light between two eternities of darkness” and recalls the “colossal efforts” his mind made “to distinguish the faintest of personal glimmers in the impersonal darkness on both sides of my life.” To undertake this work of separating himself from the cosmos, Nabokov looks not to the present, but to the past. In Chapter Three, he writes, “The act of vividly recalling a patch of the past is something that I seem to have been performing with the utmost zest all my life.”

One particularly beautiful instance of Nabokov’s use of memory in Speak, Memory comes as he describes his childhood love for a young French girl name Colette near the end of Chapter Seven. In the following passage, we see not only how his memories intertwine with each other, but also how they intertwine with the ­present:

The leaves mingle in my memory with the leather of her shoes and gloves, and there was, I remember, some detail in her attire (perhaps a ribbon on her Scottish cap, or the pattern of her stockings) that reminded me then of the rainbow spiral in a glass marble. I still seem to be holding that wisp of iridescence, not knowing exactly where to fit it, while she runs with her hoop ever faster around me and finally dissolves among the slender shadows cast on the graveled path by the interlaced arches of its low looped fence.

The alternating use of past and present tense verbs reinforces the sense that the past is linked to and informs the present, and specifically informs who Nabokov is in relation to the world around him.

Nabokov is not the only author to emphasizes the importance of memory. In Hamlet, the ghost of Hamlet’s father bids him farewell, his final words a plea to be remembered: “Adieu, adieu, adieu, remember me.” In Luke’s account of the Last Supper, Christ offers bread to his disciples, “This is my body given for you; do this in remembrance of me” (Luke 22:19). And the famous English folk verse about Guy Fawkes’s attempt to blow up the English Parliament begins, “Remember, remember! The fifth of November, the Gunpowder treason and plot; I know of no reason why the Gunpowder treason should ever be forgot!” For Nabokov, remembering his past gives shape to his present self.  For Christ and Hamlet’s father, the memories of others give hope that their identity will persist after death. And the remembrance demanded by the English folk verse helps shape a national identity. In each of these cases, the focus is shifted from the fact of basic existence to the specific existence made possible through memory.

The importance of memory in shaping identity is brought to the foreground in the 2012 film Robot & Frank. The first feature film by director Jake Schreier, Robot & Frank won the Sundance Film Festival’s Alfred P. Sloan prize for films about technology. Set in the near future, the film tells the story of an elderly man named Frank (Frank Langella) who is suffering from the early stages of dementia. His son, Hunter (James Marsden), grows frustrated with his father’s inability to care for himself, so he buys him a robot to help him cook, clean, and stay active. Frank is initially quite resistant to the robot, but when he realizes that the robot has no moral programming, he begins to use the robot to help him return to his former life as a burglar and high-end jewel thief. (Spoilers from the film follow.)

Robot & Frank handles the theme of memory in a number of ways, most obviously through the direct conversations that Frank has with his robot about memory and existence. Early in the film, the robot guilts Frank into eating healthfully and going for walks by telling him, “If you die eating cheeseburgers, what do you think happens to me? I’ll have failed. They’ll send me back to the warehouse and wipe my memory.” Here, the robot identifies memory loss as the worst possible fate, rather than physical destruction or being shut off. Later, however, the robot reveals to Frank that he was lying, that he doesn’t “care if [his] memory is erased or not.” Frank asks, “But how can you not care about something like that?” The robot responds, “Think about it this way. You know that you’re alive. You think, therefore you are.”

And Frank clearly does care about losing his memory. After pulling off a multi-million dollar jewel heist, Frank destroys all the evidence of his crime, but he pauses before wiping the robot’s memory, even though he knows that these very memories could be downloaded and used to convict him of the crime. Frank resists reformatting the robot because he sees a reflection of himself in the robot. If the robot were to lose its memory Frank might finally have to admit that he, too, is starting to lose his.

When the local sheriff, the man he robbed, and even Frank’s own son threaten to break down the door of his home, Frank finally does reformat the robot’s memory. As Frank pushes the button, the robot slumps forward, and Frank enfolds him in a brief embrace, physically bestowing upon the robot the humanity that Frank has come to see in the robot. Perhaps even more importantly, the very next scene in the movie is not a showdown between Frank and the sheriff, but an abrupt transition to Frank in a memory care center. Hunter has come to visit him, and Frank asks him how he likes Princeton, a college his son has not attended in more than a decade. Dementia is already slowly taking over Frank’s mind. The reformatting of the robot resulted not only in the loss of his memory, but also in the loss of Frank’s.

While the primary narrative of Robot & Frank directly addresses the theme of memory loss, the film reinforces issues of memory and identity in more subtle ways as well. In one particularly fascinating scene, Frank is describing the jewel heist plan to the robot. Scenes of the two of them carrying out the heist are interspersed throughout Frank’s description. It is not immediately clear whether we are seeing the heist actually happening or rather a vision of what could be. This blurring of imagination and reality underscores how the stories we tell ourselves have tremendous power in shaping the reality of the world in which we live. It almost would not matter if Frank actually committed the heist. What matters is that he thinks that he did. 

Additionally, the story of Frank and his robot is intertwined with the story of the town’s librarian, Jennifer (Susan Sarandon), and the closing of the public library. All the books from the library are being taken and scanned, and the ­physical structure of the library is being turned into a community gathering space. While the stories contained in the library books will be preserved, Frank and Jennifer still see this transition as a profound loss, and the viewer is invited to make the connection between the loss of the library and Frank’s own memory loss. This connection adds yet another layer of complexity to the film, suggesting that in our increasing reliance on digital technology, we are losing something physical that gives a tangible form to our ­memories.

Robot & Frank ends on a note of warmth, yet the film’s suggestion that Frank is losing his memory and, with it, his identity darkens the tone. This, along with the fact that as many as one in forty-five Americans will be affected by Alzheimer’s disease by the year 2050, might leave viewers with a bleak vision of the future. Such a vision, however, overlooks a key facet of Nabokov’s autobiography, and of other works of film, literature, and art. Even thoughSpeak, Memoryis Nabokov’s way of remembering himself, it provides a way for others to remember him as well. Similarly, Christ’s words, “Do this in remembrance of me,” remind us that memory is not just an individual act. It is also a collective ritual, conducted together to remember those who are important to us. Through stories, songs, and pictures, we can try to remember who we are individually, and when we fail, there are others, perhaps for generations to come, who can help us remember ourselves.

Jennifer Miller teaches English at Normandale Community College in Minneapolis, Minnesota.