Judy Blume on Her Joyful Life at 85: 'Keep Dancing! Keep Doing Whatever You Can Do' (Exclusive)

Mar. 15, 2025

Photo: Saul Martinez/The New York Times

What a lifetime it’s been — and she’s not done yet.

“I don’t know what 85 means,” Blume says. “But I feel that there’s a lot more that I want to do. I love doing this.”

Born in 1938 and raised in suburban Elizabeth, New Jersey, Blume began writing as a young housewife when her two young children (daughter Randy was born in 1961, son Lawrence in 1963) were small. She was then married to her first husband, John Blume, a lawyer she had met while in college. “I’m an intuitive writer,” she says, looking back. “I don’t analyze a lot and the story just comes.”

Once the stories started coming, they didn’t stop. AfterMargaretcameDeenie,BlubberandForever,among others, which addressed then-taboo subjects like menstruation and masturbation. Blume became a public figure, appearing on television to talk about writing for kids, and sometimes to defend her work against the criticism it attracted.

“A book cannot harm a child,” Blume says in a film clip from the documentary, and as an active member of the National Coalition Against Censorship, the author continues to advocate for the freedom to read.

Amazon Prime Video /Courtesy Everett

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At the same time, she was navigating her own life changes. Her marriage to John ended (Blume calls it “a long, perfectly reasonable first marriage of 16 years”) and she soon embarked on a disastrous second marriage (which she remembers as “jumping into the frying pan — a small disaster for me”). Around the time of her second divorce, Blume began writing books for adults — the first,Wifey, came out in 1978.

In 1979, she met Cooper, then a law professor. “He moved in on our second date,” Blume says, and they’ve been together ever since. “We’ve been through a lot together and he’s wonderful,” she adds. “I mean, we’re so different. We’re so the same, but then we’re so different. He’s laid back. No anxieties. And he makes me feel so safe in my world, just being with him.”

Judy Blume and her husband George Cooper.Courtesy Judy Blume

So how does Judy Blume account for her joy — and enduring beauty — at 85? “Isn’t it luck, really?” she asks. “It’s luck and maybe it’s genes.”

Part of her legendary energy goes back to her own father, who died in 1959. “I always thought I would die really young because of my father’s family. Nobody lived to be 60,” she says. It had an impact on her own life, Blume thinks, prompting her to “Hurry, hurry, hurry. Another book, another book, another book. Hurry, hurry, hurry. And [then you] turn around and suddenly you’re 85.”

Above all, she says, “Keep moving. Keep dancing! Keep doing whatever you can do.”

Judy Blume Foreverwill begin streaming on Prime Video April 21.

source: people.com