A Fulbright scholar with six honorary doctorates, Rosenblatt has a Ph.D. from Harvard University where he taught writing and modern literature from 1968 to 1973 and he was, at age 29, the youngest House Master in Harvard's history. Roger Rosenblatt started his career in 1975 as a literary editor for The New Republic. He has also been a columnist and editor-at-large for Life magazine, the editor of U.S. News & World Report, a columnist and editorial board member of The Washington Post and editor-at-large of Time Inc.

He is known for his essays on the McNeil/Lehrer News Hour for which he won both Peabody and Emmy Awards. His Children of War, written in 1983, won the Robert F. Kennedy book prize and has been published in many languages.

Rosenblatt grew up in New York City, where Jon Beck Shank was one of his High School English teachers.

Roger Rosenblatt and his wife Ginny had three children, Carl, Amy Elizabeth and John. They used to live in Quogue, Long Island. In 2007, Amy, 38, died suddenly while exercising at home, from cardiac arrest caused by "an anomalous coronary artery". Subsequently, Rosenblatt and his wife went to live with their son-in-law, Harris Solomon, and their three grandchildren. Rosenblatt wrote about the aftermath of their daughter's death in New Yorker magazine.

• Black Fiction (1976)
• Children of War (1983)
• Life Itself (1993)
• Coming Apart: A Memoir of the Harvard Wars of 1969 (1997)
• Consuming Desires: Consumption, Culture, and the Pursuit of Happiness (1999)
• Rules for Aging: A Wry and Witty Guide to Life (2000)
• Where We Stand: 30 Reasons for Loving Our Country (2002)
• Anything Can Happen (2004)
• Lapham Rising (2007)
• Beet: A Novel (2008)
• Making Toast: A Family Story (2010)

Rosenblatt discussed Making Toast on the PBS Newshour.