I show the relevance of Lou Andreas-Salomé's psychoanalytic texts to the science of memory. I explain why she regarded a failing memory as a loyal indicator about how memory worked and connect her reasoning with her theory of narcissism which she unwittingly made computational. I explain her portrayal of memory as a builder or homo faber, a view she shared with Henri Bergson although she arrived to it independently. I show how cognitive psychology and neuroscience followed up on her investigations and ultimately vindicated her theories. I finally argue why today's researchers on memory should both accept Freudian death drive as Salomé understood it and cautiously use categories of information.