Abstract: Nabokov incorporates elements of memory into the narrative, plot of Despair, constructs the two-tiered mnemonic system: the first tier operates with the narrator’s personal memories; the second tier runs in a mode of intertextual memory, through which Hermann’s recollections of the past, the intertextual reminiscences directed at the reader proceed in parallel. In Despair, Nabokov applies several narrative strategies, such as allusion, parody, pastiche, irony, to integrate Dostoevsky’s narrative artistry in The Double, Notes from Underground, The Possessed, Crime, Punishment, into his own memory narrative, work out a series of intertextual memories filled with imitation, parody, critique. The reader may follow the two-tiered mnemonic system built by Nabokov, going through the process of parody, intertextuality, gradually shifting from the narrator’s personal memories to the memories presented at the level of intertextuality. What occurs behind the two-tiered mnemonic system is the poetic dialogue, artistic face-off between Nabokov, Dostoevsky. Such a complicated mnemonic phenomenon poses a challenge to the existing models for mnemonic studies, but provides new room for the research on cultural mnemonics at the same time

Key words: Nabokov, Dostoevsky, Despair, intertextuality, memory