I vaguely remember my first introduction to The Hobbit, through the BBC radio dramatisation—a spectacular 8-episode series that my friends had on tape. We listened to it on long car trips, enthralled by the adventures of Bilbo, Gandalf, and the Dwarves. Years later, I fell just as much in love with The Lord of the Rings, so different in tone and yet still a story in which small, seemingly insignificant people find their courage through impossible situations and support their friends, emotionally and practically, through dangerous adventures.
In neither story did romance take a major role, and at the time, I did not question it.
* * *
Only recently have I been comfortable enough to say that I am asexual. Maybe it was pure shyness, maybe uncertainty about committing to the term, but for a long time it wasn’t something I would have talked about aloud. But looking back, it’s always been part of my makeup, and as with many lovers of fantasy, part of how I’ve always constructed my identity has been through fictional characters. By my early twenties, I hadn’t encountered many examples of clearly ace characters in fiction, save perhaps for Sherlock Holmes, who I found a bit intimidating rather than relatable. In my favourite stories, however, I found characters who helped me to figure myself out. Bilbo Baggins, and later Frodo, defined my identity for me in different ways, before I had the vocabulary or understanding to describe it for myself.
Perhaps I didn’t have a word for it as such, but in the grand tradition of euphemisms and metaphors, I thought of myself as “like Bilbo,” or, when I was more romantically inclined, “like Frodo.” What hit me later was that neither of these characters were not defined in terms of what they lacked, and because of this, I didn’t think of myself as lacking something either. Finding myself single and inclined to remain so, at an age when most of my contemporaries were dating and hooking up, I wondered if I should feel differently about it, or whether my own fantasies (strong friendships, sincere declarations of love) were asking too much of a world driven by sex. Still, two of my fictional mainstays seemed unbothered by bachelorhood…
In Bilbo’s story, and later in Frodo’s, there was nothing wrong with being single. I recognise now the rarity of that situation, and its value to someone struggling with the realisation that what works for most people is not working for them. Singleness in Middle-earth, generally, does not seem to bear the burden of social stigma. Over half of the Fellowship are unmarried and childless. The idea that a fulfilling life and meaningful contributions to society did not depend on my wish to marry and have children has given me the kind of hope that these stories convey so well—a quiet but tenacious hope that sees me through difficult times.
* * *
Buy the Book
Drowned Country
It was not until I took a class on Tolkien in the third year of my undergrad studies that I started thinking about this more seriously. My professor pointed out the distinct lack of female characters in The Hobbit, as well as the lack of a love story in it, and asked us what we thought. Aside from the implication that a woman would necessarily act as a love interest (an infuriating assumption that my professor didn’t intend, but that is another conversation) there was the subject of romance brought into the open, and its absence noted. I do wish that there had been more women in Tolkien’s work, not least because I love those that he did write as fully fledged characters. The lack of a love story, though, did not (and does not) bother me.
By that point I was past the age of pretending to be above such things as romance: I’d realised that I did like it, I liked reading about it, I was a little uncertain about myself in regards to it, and I wasn’t keen on the notion of sex. It was nice that other people liked it so much, but I wavered between thinking that I was too young for it (I was perhaps 21 at the time of the course) and thinking that I was too busy (I was, as mentioned, a third-year undergrad and one of those who was constantly overwhelmed by something or other). The fact that there was no love story in The Hobbit had frankly gone over my head.
Bilbo never seems inclined toward romance, certainly. From the beginning, he lives comfortably alone, welcoming visitors—the consummate host, and probably an excellent friend. Following his adventure, he settles down again to enjoy his newly increased wealth and later adopts Frodo, finding familial fulfilment in the role of cousin and guardian. There is none of the emptiness or brokenness that accompany stereotypes of single people, and though the neighbourhood thinks him eccentric, Bilbo remains confident and popular right up to his famous disappearance on his eleventy-first birthday.
* * *
Frodo, on the other hand, has a profound romantic side. I read his relationship with Sam as a romance without sex, and in hindsight it should have been searingly obvious to me that this being my ideal said something about who I am and what I want in my life. Shipping is legitimate, and wonderful, but when it came to my own reading there was something elusive and intriguing there, something that I wanted. (Not the Ring, to be perfectly clear on this.) They were together, in a way that I could see myself being together with someone. (Not in Mordor, again to be clear.) Theirs was a love that differed from casual or even closer friendship, and I appreciated that, even while trying to work out what exactly it was that I appreciated.
While there is a class difference between them and professional loyalty may be part of Sam’s devotion to Frodo, the longer the two are together, the less this matters. Throughout The Fellowship of the Ring, despite their closeness, theirs is still a master-servant relationship to some degree, and Frodo is more prominent. But then come two books’ worth of wandering with only each other and Gollum for company, terrible dangers, and a rescue from the hands of the orcs. Sam becomes Frodo’s equal in narrative weight, in character, in significance, and Frodo comes to see him as such: as Samwise the Stouthearted, a hero in his own right.
It is strange to think that the best and most powerful parts of their love story come at the darkest points in the books, when they have run out of any hope save for what they find in each other. Then again, perhaps that’s the point… When all else is stripped away, what is it that sustains them? Sam storms the tower in which Frodo is imprisoned and sings in the darkness, seeming to hear “a faint voice answering him.” They face the worst places they can possibly go together, and are ready to die together. It is a love that responds to the direst of circumstances by growing only stronger, and that ultimately saves the world—and the idea that love could do that without being necessarily sexual in nature inspired me inestimably.
I don’t like to talk much about the end of the third volume, because I have yet to complete it without devolving into undignified tears. But I think it is important that the bond between Frodo and Sam is not forgotten even as Frodo departs the shores of Middle-earth: Leaving the last few pages of the Red Book, Frodo trusts Sam to complete the work, just as they completed the journey together. (As a writer, I can only hope to have someone in my life who loves me enough to complete my own unfinished stories.)
* * *
Brokenness, and eventual unbelonging, are part of Frodo’s story, of course. Bilbo’s too, but he only leaves Middle-earth as a much older hobbit, and has had the chance to enjoy years of a fulfilling and happy life beforehand. This brokenness is not tied to his singleness, because while he certainly was in no frame of mind for courtship on his return to the Shire, Frodo had also gone fifty years before the quest without marrying or falling in love. It is something else, a trauma or sadness that he cannot share with others and which causes them to worry about him—but even this lingering damage serves to highlight the importance and strength of the relationships he has, and the love that he and his closest friends share.
I mention this because brokenness and unbelonging have been part of my experience, too, for far different reasons than the lingering effects of an epic quest. I move around a lot, and in doing so, find it hard to keep in touch with many of my friends. I have not had a sustained group of friends in one place for many years. The pain that results from this is as real and profound as that of forsaken romantic love, and it has been important in shaping who I am. It isn’t because of my disinterest in sex, and I am not lonely for that reason, but because of other kinds of love and belonging that I wish I had. That I can find these in a beloved book is some solace, and especially seeing them so highly valued, and their loss mourned.
This valuing of friend-love is demonstrated so early on in The Fellowship of the Ring that it would be easy to pass it by unnoticed, but the “Conspiracy Unmasked” chapter strikes such a strong note for friendship that it must be mentioned. This chapter also shows how different Frodo’s journey will be from Bilbo’s, and foreshadows some of the elements that will decide major events later on in the story. To my mind, it is also an indication that Frodo’s priority is friendship, as it is these friends whose impending parting he agonises over in the preceding months…
While it may be easier, from a narrative standpoint, to have a single hobbit going off into the unknown, not leaving behind a wife and children, it may bear different complications, as evidenced by Frodo hating to leave his friends, trying to depart unnoticed. It doesn’t work, of course, because his friendships are the strongest bonds in his life. If Bilbo was able to run off into the blue with a gang of unknown dwarves at a moment’s notice, Frodo had no such chance in “Conspiracy Unmasked,” because in lingering too long he tipped off his friends that something was going on.
Leaving again, at the end of The Return of the King, is no easier. Frodo tries once again to slip away unnoticed—and again fails. His friends catch him up. His Sam sees him off and understands why he has to go. Though Sam by this point is married, I continued to believe that Frodo was the love of his life, but in a different way. Merry, Pippin, and Sam have the chance to bid Frodo farewell and share the pain of parting, in a sober echo of that earlier, more ebullient scene.
* * *
The resonance of fictional characters depends on many things. It isn’t always a set of statistics that lines up exactly as expected, but sometimes a surprise: sometimes the characters I identify with are the ones that seem nothing like me at first. But this does not change the fact that representation matters, and that when some part of ourselves that we rarely see reflected in fiction makes its appearance, we recognise it. It comes as a great joy and relief.
I found myself in the Bagginses—characters who seemed a little at odds with their communities, perhaps, but with strong social lives. Characters who seemed intelligent enough, but still made mistakes that wiser characters could have warned them against. They were not confident, they were dreamers. Bilbo rushed out the door without a pocket handkerchief. Frodo inadvertently led his friends into danger within two hours or so of walking out the door at Crickhollow. These are the kinds of people who would be well set up for a heroic romance, if they had been so inclined, but Bilbo was quite content with no romance at all, and Frodo shared a different kind of love with Sam through their adventure and beyond. For me, their relationship is a romantic friendship, simply because that is my ideal and I like the thought of sharing it with them.
They resonated in different ways. Bilbo’s life as an ordinary bachelor (before the adventure) and as an eccentric bachelor (after) made me realise what fun singleness could be. Frodo’s upbringing, simultaneously comfortable and threaded with a yearning for adventure, followed by a journey that left him neither rich and happy like Bilbo nor married like a typical adventure hero, made me see the importance of having people to rely on in dark times, to “trust…to stick to [me] through thick and thin—to the bitter end,” as Merry put it. And in both cases, my emerging ace brain responded with the persistent feeling that I was like them—not because of something we lacked, but because of all that we shared. The road goes ever on and on, and I’m glad to be able to follow it in such good company.
Isobel Granby is a writer, PhD student, and artist currently based in Newfoundland. Her hobbies include violin, fencing, and gazing upon the raging sea. She is currently seeking an adventure that will be terribly exciting but not cause her to miss second breakfast.
I tend to think of The Hobbit as a bromance. Bunch of bro’s get together, feast, and then go off to slay the dragon! *rraaww*
Good essay. I always liked the way Casablanca ended with the friendship between Rick and Louis, and not the romance
I agree with you about Bilbo. As a person on the ace spectrum myself, I recognize myself in Bilbo. He’s a bachelor with a quiet little life and if he temporarily got caught up in an adventure which took him abroad for a year, he returns to his quiet little life – a bit wealthier, a bit more confident, a bit more broad-minded than his neighbors (who looked askance at his strange visitors), but still a bachelor and quite content, too.
I think Frodo, on the other hand, is something else. He might be ace. But I think his circumstances may have had more of a hand in things. He received the Ring at a much younger age, and it was more active and it allows no other suitors. And I think his relationship with Sam was less bromance and more the brotherhood of war, changing master and servant into equals on the battlefield. That is something Tolkien understood. Those bonds can look like romantic love to outsiders, if they don’t know what to look for. And when Frodo returned, he was too injured from war to ever drop back into his quiet little life as a bachelor. Had he not suffered those grievous wounds to body and soul, who knows what might have happened?
Still, that’s the point about reading fiction. We each bring ourselves into the story and take different things from it. I enjoyed reading your take on things.
I’m glad that Isobel Granby found inspiration and solace in her interpretations of fictional characters; nothing I say here should be taken as criticism of her or disparagement of her feelings and opinions.
As a 65+ person, one of the things that saddens me is the loss of agape in fiction and interpretations of fiction. It’s a strictly modern idea that people who have more than acquaintanceships are sleeping together or want to do so.
Thank you for this! I’m not ace (although I did wonder a bit when I was in high school and would even have to field pointed questions, because I just was not inclined to date. Thing is, I was also a huge romantic. The few times I had clumsy romances though, something always felt off, especially when it came to physical affection. Although, my senior year of high school, I did end up blindsided by an epic trainwreck of a crush, although it was not on your standard teen heartthrob type. Turns out demisexual is a better term to describe me) and am now married and with kids, but I’ve always really loved the deep friendships depicted here, and the exploration of other, just as legitamate, types of love.
James Mendur@@.-@ points out another perfectly legitimate interpretation that is outside of the ace scale, I believe. But I concur with swampyankee@5. I appreciate this essay for its courage to push back against the pressures to interpret deep love as a purely sexual attraction (with or without the sense of “romance”). OTOH, the loss of agape love is a loss I also mourn.
Not that strange. Tolkien said that his stories are analogies from his time in the military. In his day, there were no women in the military, at least not significant numbers. Hence, women won’t feature in the storyline as much. He’s not some political rolemodel by any stretch, but this is understandable.
This is fascinating. I am also demisexual, and went through a lot of confusion and worry when I was in my teens because it was very different from what those around me and the surrounding culture told me I could expect. At one point as a teenager I even saw a counsellor about this. I was calm and straightforward, but she scoffed at me and said, “So you want to know whether you’re a freak,” which was so absurdly dismissive that I regretted going. (This memory especially makes me shudder now because I am cisgender and more-or-less straight. In other words, I can only imagine how much worse things were in all of these respects for my LGBTQ+ peers growing up in the same place and time, and I feel a lot of empathy here.) I finally ended up explaining my weird not-quite-asexuality with an entire paragraph every time, which partway through 2010 turned into the most clear-cut case of ‘whoa, there’s a word for that!’ I’d ever encountered. I’ve been on the lookout for better representation ever since…and yet it hadn’t even occurred to me that there was no romance in The Hobbit. I suspect I read it too young (I was 12, and this was around the same time that a lot of other classic/British fantasy was very easily lost on me – I liked Harry Potter, but couldn’t yet follow what was going on in His Dark Materials). I should reread now that I’m well into adulthood and have a much better understanding of the genre. Plus, I’ve been meaning to get to LOTR, my unfamiliarity with which is a source of moderate embarrassment. Heh!
‘Confirmed bachelors’ and even spinsters were very much a thing in Tolkien’s England. Obviously not all such cases were due to demographics or same sex preference. Tolkien may not have known the word asexual but he certainly saw the thing in his everyday life.
It has always bothered me that spinster seems perjorative while batchelor doesn’t seem to have the same connotation.
Regardless, it would seem the journey itself creates bonds between the people involved. Shared experience and dependance on each other are powerful. Whether that leads to love (of any flavor) depends on the individuals.
A beautiful article. Thank you.
@9,
After WW1, there was also a demographic hole due to the vast number of war casualties: there simply weren’t as many eligible men as there were marriage-aged women. Some other countries, for example France and (absolute worst case in Europe) Serbia had even worse demographic holes.
But, yes, there were also large numbers of men and women who never married. One of my great-grandfathers was raised by a maiden aunt (both his parents died of TB, which his father may have contracted during his service in the US Civil War). His brother was fostered to a farm family, and never married.
I did a blog on this a while back and you are correct, Bilbo and Frodo were not only very different in the Shire but odd to literature in many ways. For on, Bilbo has the status of a sort of a Victorian country Squire yet he does not have a domestic to help him. He does all his own cooking, cleaning, mending. Perhaps it is the culture of the Shire but maybe not! Tolkien lost his mother young and no doubt had to fend for himself in many ways despite his academic life. But somebody noted that Bilbo could have easily been a female character, it really didn’t fit into it much except when you consider the social norms of the time. From personal experience, my mother always thought I would be single and taught me how to sew, do laundry, etc. I never knew why she thought I would be a bachelor.
As for Sam, some criticized the character for being too much a parody of a stock character that amused Tolkien, yet we know Sam was an amalgamation of all the Sams he met during the Great War and was impressed by. No great thinkers yet they did the unthinkable every day. Sam may be a little subservient to Frodo but it can be thought of as a mentor situation as well- Frodo was a lot older and Hobbits would have respected elders. Sam was no doubt in awe of Bilbo and therefore Frodo. But he grew and became much more.
So why did a catholic father of 4 have bachelors as protagonists? Because it would be wrong and criminal for a married man with children and a family to support and raise to traipse off into the blue for a selfish adventure. That smacks of a ‘deadbeat dad’, abandoning them while telling them he is off to seek a fortune while instead he is enjoying himself and avoiding responsibility. This is reading a lot into a children’s book but there it is. And it set the trend for LOTR. Notice the Hobbit companions are all single. Sam mentions he and Rosie are sort of engaged but he didn’t ‘speak up’ because he was leaving. We know that he marries and carries on in typical Hobbit fashion, just an enlightened and wise Hobbit. Other than this, it was just convenient for Tolkien to have the Bagginses bachelors. Imagine Frodo telling his wife and kids he has to go on an epic quest to destroy a magic ring so they could be free, leaving them to fend off Black Riders and who knows what. As a father of 4 children as well, I can’t imagine writing that unless you were making a different sort of tale.
This was lovely to read. The relationship between Frodo and Sam was absolutely a key (though it didn’t unlock the door for a reaaaaaally long time) to uncovering my own demi/bi-sexuality, and the first time I saw a glimmer of what it was I really wanted for myself, and what I knew was deep in myself–I couldn’t have possibly described it, and didn’t find the right words for it until much later, but it was the first glimpse I had of queer relationships. I too headcanon Bilbo as delightfully ace. Thanks again.
@@.-@ I would see some of the relationships, especially Sam & Frodo as more philia than agape. The strong & loving bond of siblings who would die for one another, and that sort of deep bond above just friendship but not romantic, is all too lacking in both friendship & real life (as Lewis himself bemoaned).
That because of the influence of the ring. It would not allow others to influence it current victim. Who ever wears it becomes enslaved to it. That why they would fight to keep the ring. No one person can ever replace that.
Ironically, as I did not read the Hobbit & the Lord of the Rings till I was a sophmore in HS and at that point already identified as gay even though it would be years till I was out. I saw the lack of female companions for Bilbo and Frodo meant they were gay. Not that I seriously considered that Tolkien would have ever written them as such. Just wishful thinking on my part but to do so did make me feel less alone at the time.
I’m also firmly on the Aro/Ace spectrum, yet somehow I didn’t realize until I read this article that this is certainly a big part of the reason why I have such a strong emotional connection to these two hobbits and their story. I’m so good at seeing myself in my favorites and yet I missed this obvious connection. Possibly because I hadn’t fully worked through my personal identity when I first fell in love with them. Thank you for the wonderful insight!
I’m glad that the writer found something meaningful in these stories, but Frodo and Sam were not having a romance. They were best friends going through a dangerous time together.Sam was there fro Frodo in his time of need. Merry and Pippin jst kinda got tangled up in it.
Think of when these books were written and what the writer was like. The Hobbit written during WWI and the LotR written during WWII.
Bilbo, was just a confirmed bachelor.
There are few women, cause in war time there were no women in the trenches only your brothers in arms.
While I agree with much of the commentary, I get a little tired of the shipping of Sam and Frodo.
It used to be that men and women could not be friends in fiction. There always had to be a “romantic” love between them that was “better” than mere friendship. Some of the best fictional friendships are between people who are not romantically inclined or interested in each other. Now men can no longer be friends, or love each other as friends without it being romantic or sexual.
Part of this, I think is caused by the hypersexualization/romantization we see in advertising. I find it sad that people can only be friends, or even comrades who bond through great adversity, if the reader / viewer can bind them into a sexual (at heart) relationship.
@20 YES. And there’s so much revisionism looking for LGBTQ narratives in past history & fiction that enables this, too. Like… people (rightfully!) call out toxic masculinity for keeping men from having close friendships, or being comfortable with non-sexual physical intimacy like women share (hugging, cuddling, brushing each others’ hair, sharing beds at sleepovers, etc) that men avoid or get attacked over. They talk about how in literature & history men used to do those things, up until even the late 1800s. But then when characters DO it or people look at history everyone’s like “GAY!”
Can’t have it both ways. Normalizing close friendship and physical contact and breaking down unhealthy masculine ideas doesn’t mean pushing the other narrative, especially with no evidence. It’s counterproductive.
Thank you so much for writing this. I was firmly in my 30s when I learned about grey asexuality / demisexuality, and it made me look back on some of my favorite characters with different eyes. Now I can add Bilbo and Frodo to that list!
Also, thank you for having the courage to write about your take on a classic. The purists may come out of the woodwork frothing, but for those of us who have desperately needed to feel seen at different points in our lives, we know the solace found in those imaginations and interpretations. Thank you so much for sharing this!
I really enjoyed this read; thank you very much so this intriguing take on an all time favourite of mine.
My opinion on this is very close to @3. : Bilbo the ace Bachelor, and not only because of demographics or Tolkien’s living situation or The Hobbit being a children’s book, but Frodo being brothers in arms with Sam, but not romantical partners, and besides that just being too damaged afterwards to pursue another close personal relationship.
I enjoy reading these different interpretations. Keep it going =)