Prue Leith on staying visible challenging ageism

“Inside every older person is a younger person wondering what happened”
– Terry Pratchett

You know you’re old when your three-year-old grandchild grabs your neck and says, ‘Nana, why is your neck so stringy?’ And you can’t deny the stooping back, greying hair, widening waist and, and, and . . . But I think old age is largely in the mind.

My parents’ generation, and many of mine, imbibed the idea that once we’re past 60, all sorts of things are ‘inappropriate’ for us: dancing, sitting on a barstool, wearing pillarbox red, smoking weed. They seem to think we should all wear greige, sit in a corner and knit.

I think they were brainwashed. They got the wrong  idea of their worth, concurring with the idea that oldies should be neither seen nor heard, that we should dress as unobtrusively as possible, that we should stop thinking about romance, love and sex, that we are too old to be of any use to anyone, and that we should devote ourselves to good causes and ungrateful grandchildren.

So often, we unconsciously buy into that viewpoint – and even if we don’t, few of us actually challenge it. Yet we should.

I’m often approached by strangers who say something like, ‘You’re so brave. I used to wear bright colours, and I loved it, but since I turned 60, it doesn’t feel right.’ Happily, such introspection has never bothered me. My generation, born during World War II, and certainly the next one (the post-war baby boomers) expect to stay healthy until we drop. So why can’t we stay active and visible too?

I’m afraid this book isn’t a compendium of solutions to the ills of old age. It’s more of a rant. Being old necessarily brings setbacks, but sometimes we make them bigger than they have to be. I cannot honestly say that the situations and problems discussed in this book (and which many an old woman will recognise) have bothered me too much.

I have been blessed with a certain lack of imagination, or at least a lack of sensitivity. I have not picked up on any waves of disapproval when I wear a rainbow of vulgar colours. I’m too egotistical to think I shouldn’t join in a conversation or that my opinion doesn’t count, and it simply doesn’t occur to me that I’m too old to be of use.

My generation should be profoundly grateful to Germaine Greer and the feminists of the 1960s and 1970s, who made it okay for women to have an opinion and express it forcefully. I remember, a few weeks after meeting John Playfair (who would become my husband), we went to a party, and I sat next to some pompous ass at dinner. He was overbearing (‘You wouldn’t understand’), dismissive (‘Don’t worry your pretty little head about it’) and thick as two planks (‘It’s not your fault: women just don’t have the staying power for the top jobs’), but I really enjoyed taking him on.

We had a right set-to, with most of the table firmly on my side. I ended up feeling quite sorry for the poor mug. It did cross my mind that John, whom I fancied something rotten, might be put off by my stridency. But he was delighted, saying he’d been dying to prick that overblown balloon for years.

It seems that single women are (maybe perforce?) braver and more independent than ones with partners. Many of my single elderly friends are supremely independent, doing everything they can, while they can. A New York friend of my age walks, drives and takes the subway all over the city, just as she did in her fifties. Her attitude, which I am sure is the right one, is that she is no more vulnerable to attack on the subway, or likely to crash the car, than she was when younger, so why the fuss?

Single women have to resist any idea that they shouldn’t go alone to the theatre, the cinema, a gallery, a sports event. Even though I’m married, going to events alone doesn’t bother me; in fact, I rather like it. On the rare occasions that I go alone to a play I enjoy it hugely. A single ticket is usually available last-minute through Twickets, the online ethical ticketing agency.

It’s liberating not having to worry whether your companion is enjoying the evening. I’ll pre-order a glass of wine for the interval, enjoy having the programme to myself while waiting for curtain-up, maybe strike up a brief conversation with someone in the bar during the interval, with no obligation to ever see them again if I don’t care for them. Also, if the play is dire, I can leave without consulting or upsetting anyone. I heartily recommend it.

Of course, there are some things we can no longer do, just because our bodies won’t let us. In my case, they are: playing tennis (I’d fall over); running (ditto); riding horses (too old to fall off and break something); riding a bike (too wobbly); dancing (also too wobbly); serious gardening (too weak to dig or push a loaded barrow and once down on the ground, can’t get up again); and fly fishing (except from a boat).

But there’s quite enough that I still love to do, and which I hope to be up for until I’m (as my husband John so charmingly puts it) the wrong side of the grass. I could not live without writing, and I read a lot. Indeed, I cannot go to sleep without at least 20 minutes, preferably an hour, of reading.

I still do a lot of TV and stage performances, which I greatly enjoy and will continue with until I’m no longer up to the job – which, at 86, could be soon. I want to jump rather than be pushed.

This is an extract from Being Old and Learning to Love It! by Prue Leith (Octopus, £20). Buy a copy from Bookshop.org here.

Or buy a copy from Blackwell’s here.

Idler Festival 2026

Dame Prue Leith is one of our star guests at the upcoming Idler Festival, where she’ll be chatting to us about the trials and taboos of growing older – along with its unexpected joys. And nothing is off limits!

The Idler Festival is at Fenton House and Gardens, Hampstead, London on Friday 10 to Sunday 12 July. Prue Leith is appearing on the Saturday.

See who else is performing and buy tickets on our Festival poster here. Just click on the performer’s name for more details.

See you there!

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