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<\/a><\/p>\nSource\u00a0<\/a>\u00a0(Emilyeretica, Deviantart)<\/p>\n The first time I read The Hobbit<\/em>, I was in fifth grade. I liked the plot; I liked the style of narration; I liked discovering the backstory to The Lord of the Rings<\/em>. It didn\u2019t occur to me to care about its utter lack of female characters. I didn\u2019t even notice. It was one book out of the hundred others I read that year, and this one characteristic simply didn\u2019t matter.<\/p>\n For those of you who haven\u2019t read The Hobbit<\/em> \u2013 and especially for those of you who have only seen the movies \u2013 there is no romance in the original story. The main character, Bilbo, is a hobbit who uses his wits and natural ability to walk lightly to survive the quest into which he is thrust. His companions on this quest are thirteen (male) dwarves and an old (male) wizard. There are no real romantic interests for any of them; their focus is completely on their mission.<\/p>\n I\u2019m trying to imagine this story with an all-female cast, and it\u2019s surprising how hard it is. Who writes a story completely inhabited by women? Who writes a story in which the armies, the saviors, the villains, the companions, the mentors, and the protagonists are all women? Who writes a story that is not only solely inhabited by post-adolescent women, but also completely free of these characters pining after one romantic interest or another?<\/p>\n When I try to think of other stories sans romance, I can only think of Herman Melville\u2019s \u201cBartleby, the Scrivener,\u201d which is also a story of men. I\u2019m hard-pressed to come up with another. I am especially hard-pressed to come up with one that features women. They must exist (if you\u2019ve read one, let me know), but it\u2019s telling nonetheless that I can\u2019t think of one.<\/p>\n Why do The Hobbit<\/em> and \u201cBartleby\u201d feel so natural, so complete, but I can\u2019t come up with a story featuring women that doesn\u2019t at least peripherally involve love? Not that romantic love isn\u2019t a worthy topic of novels, to be sure \u2013 but when was it decided that our stories had<\/em> to include it?<\/p>\n Since Hollywood apparently decided no one would see a movie without romantic love, this all feels relevant. As a Tolkien fan, I would have seen the movie even without a single named female character. It\u2019d fail the Bechdel test, but 1) The Hobbit<\/em>: Desolation of Smaug<\/em> already does and 2) The failure belongs to the text the script is supposedly attempting to follow.<\/p>\n All of which is to say I have the deepest sympathy for Evangeline Lilly, the actress who plays the elf warrior Tauriel in the second Hobbit<\/em> film. Tauriel doesn\u2019t exist in the book, and I don\u2019t mind the general fact of her invention; I\u2019m glad someone made the effort to include a female character in the movie. I don\u2019t even mind the inclusion of Legolas, as his presence nicely sets up his position in The Lord of the Rings<\/em>.<\/p>\n