More Rules for Aging: Making the Most of Your Ridiculous, Wondrous Life

by Roger Rosenblatt

Genres: Nonfiction

152 pages, Hardcover

Published June 9, 2026

About the author

ROGER ROSENBLATT, whose work has been published in 14 languages, is the author of five New York Times Notable Books of the Year, and three Times bestsellers, including the memoirs KAYAK MORNING, THE BOY DETECTIVE, and MAKING TOAST, originally an essay in the New Yorker. His newest book is THE STORY I AM, a collection on writing and the writing life.

Rosenblatt has also written seven off-Broadway plays, notably the one-person Free Speech in America, that he performed at the American Place Theater, named one of the Times's "Ten Best Plays of 1991." Last spring at the Bay Street Theater in Sag Harbor, he performed and played piano in his play, Lives in the Basement, Does Nothing, which will go to the Staller Center for the Arts at Stony Brook, and the Flea Theater in New York in 2021. He also wrote the screenplay for his bestselling novel LAPHAM RISING, to star Frank Langella, Stockard Channing, and Bobby Cannavale, currently in production.

The Distinguished Professor of English and Writing at SUNY Stony Brook/Southampton, he formerly held the Briggs-Copeland appointment in creative writing at Harvard, where he earned his Ph.D. Among his honors are two George Polk Awards; the Peabody, and the Emmy, for his essays at Time magazine and on PBS; a Fulbright to Ireland, where he played on the Irish International Basketball Team; seven honorary doctorates; the Kenyon Review Award for Lifetime Literary Achievement; and the President's Medal from the Chautauqua Institution for his body of work.

Reviews

[Ralph B · Rating 4 out of 5]

Author provides over 100 pithy, thoughtful snippets of advice for aging as a followup to an earlier collection. Most are humorous, some very clever, but all amusing. It's a very quick read but the prudent reader will digest each one rather than gobble them down like so much quick-advice popcorn.

A couple favorites summarized:
#75: Learn something even if you make no use of it.
#84: For older folks there is nothing more energizing than the company of the young. They're bright enthusiastic, informative, brimming with life, and they do not know when you're telling them lies.
#105: You're not the person you used to be. Isn't that wonderful?

[Anne · Rating 4 out of 5]

A small confection; readable in an hour. But Rosenblatt's gentle humor is omnipresent and he does propose a few "rules" for happily aging. I always look forward to his occasional guest essays in the NYTimes. Some of his personal anecdotes are quite sweet.

[Fletch · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read the whole thing, but no zing there like Rules for Aging.