I thought of something that may or may not be relevant to this discussion, it's more of a personal opinion: making Frodo start his adventure at 50, after having lived an adequate number of years comfortably as the master of Bag End and enjoying the pleasures of hobbity life makes me feel less sorry for his inability to enjoy the Shire afterwards. If Frodo was in his tweens when he started out, his story would have been too heartbreaking, even if he would have succeeded in finishing his task. We would have had an immature halfling uprooted from the Shire that he still did not get enough of, forced to become a hero before his time. Frodo at 50 indeed gives the impression that he was 'asking for it', asking for a change, an adventure, though unaware in the beginning of its potential magnitude.
Also I agree with Sleeping Beauty that Frodo's story resembles a 'coming of age' one, he 'has grown in wisdom', as Saruman says to him.
The issue of whether or not he would have succeeded in his task were he any younger is an interesting one. IMO, he might have. Frodo was always a serious and introspective nature, and his close friendship with Bilbo shows him to be more mature than his years.
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I read the Hobbit and LotR for the first time at the age of 50
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Guinevere, that's a wonderful coincidence!
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Interesting side note: while checking out a little HoME for this post, I noticed that ‘Orlando’ and ‘Vigo’ [sic] were both considered as names for Hobbits in early versions of LotR. Hum The Twilight Zone theme with me...
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*decides to be original and hum The X Files theme*
