full text can be found here
Hawthorne recounts a newspaper article about a man who one day left his house for no reason, lived across the street unbeknownst to his wife and friends (who thought him dead) for 20 years, then “he entered the door one evening, quietly, as from a day’s absence, and became a loving spouse till death.” Hawthorne then interpolates the rest of the story — Wakefield’s 20 years and what they might mean.
on leaving/being left:
“We know, each for himself, that none of us would perpetrate such a folly, yet feel as if some other might.”
(I suspect this isn’t true for most people. Whether or not actually capable of such “folly,” you must believe you am; otherwise suspicions of potential abandonment leaves you too vulnerable. By “you,” I might mean me.)
what we all want to know:
Wakefield “finds himself curious to know the progress of matters at home — how his exemplary wife will endure her widowhood of a week; and, briefly, how the little sphere of creatures and circumstances, in which he was a central object, will be affected by his removal. A morbid vanity, therefore, lies nearest the bottom of the affair.”
and what we all fear:
“Poor Wakefield! Little knowest thou thine own insignificance in this great world”
the moral?
“Amid the seeming confusion of our mysterious world, individuals are so nicely adjusted to a system, and systems to one another and to a whole, that, by stepping aside for a moment, a man exposes himself to a fearful risk of losing his place forever.”
(thanks g.r.)