Why are you all assuming a female would have had to have been a cute young human girl providing love interest?
Lets look at the races in the fellowship.
First off, dwarves. A hardy but wise dwarf woman, for example, could have gone on this quest without much problem.
Elves. Elf women carried out some extremely dangerous missions in Tolkien. Namely, Luthien's quest into the very throneroom of Morgoth - arguably more perilous and difficult than anything the Fellowship did.
Men. This is more problematic. There were warrior women in the First Age, among the people of Haleth, as someone has pointed out, and presumably they would have gone on missions with their male counterparts. But this culture did not survive into the Third Age so I agree that a human female would have seemed out of place in the fellowship.
Hobbits: we don't know much about female hobbits and what they were capable of, but they seem to be of rather domestic inclination. So probably a female hobbit would have been out of place as well.
As for women being too perfect and unrealistic in Tolkien, I agree that Tolkien's other writings reveal more depth and subtlety than LotR. As well as the women already mentioned, I would also point to Erendis (the Mariner's Wife) and Morwen Eledhwen, the mother of Turin Turambar.
[ March 19, 2003: Message edited by: Lalaith ]
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