And women, the prime instigators of this rise in late-life separations, are citing the deathly hush that descends on their homes when their children leave as one of the prime causes of marital breakdown.
Our biggest problem was the lack of communication,' laments Sarah Partington, 61, an accounts clerk. She was married to businessman Thomas, who owns a chemical cleaning company, for three-and-a-half decades. They divorced five years ago.
Not going the distance: John and Trisha Watson grew apart after 34 years of marriage
Did the same frozen silence precipitate the end of former U.S. Vice-President Al Gore's marriage?
While the Clintons were knocked by a series of marital problems (the most notorious involving Monica Lewinsky), the Gores were seen as the dream American family: handsome, square-jawed Al, his vivacious blonde wife Tipper, their four grown-up kids and a cluster of sweet-faced grandchildren.
But last week, announcing in a statement their separation after 40 years of marriage, they merely said: 'This is a mutual and mutually supportive decision that we have made together following a process of long and careful consideration.'
Friends, who say no third party is involved, have speculated that Tipper was irked by her husband's constant travelling; he is frequently away and ever more consumed by his environmental work.
In a similar way the Partingtons, who spent their married life in a five-bedroom house in Cheshire, found themselves ever more estranged once they had fulfilled the all-consuming roles of raising a family.
Their separation was a profound shock to friends, who had assumed the marriage was a happy one. For Sarah, there was no single climactic moment of crisis.
Surprise split: Former US Vice president Al Gore and his wife Tipper have separated after 40 years of marriage
Like the Gores, they married young, which appears to be a significant risk factor: Sarah was 21 and Thomas 24.
'He was the love of my life. I adored him, and never thought at our big white wedding that we would ever split,' she reflects. 'But he changed, as people do.
'He had no interest in our doing anything together, even having a meal out or planning a weekend away. I had to instigate everything in our social diary, and then he would grumble. He took no interest in me or in what I had to say,' says Sarah who now lives alone in the three-bedroom house she bought with the proceeds of her divorce.
Many couples of a similar age share Sarah's sentiments. In 2007, the latest figures available in the UK, 50 per cent more over-60s got divorced than ten years previously.
Part of the reason is increased life expectancy. Couples who are unhappy when their children fly the nest now potentially have several decades of productive and active life stretching ahead of them.
'I was brought up to believe marriage was for ever, but I was never told it could be so boring'
Sarah sums up a prevalent feeling that marriages often seem to lose their purpose once the children are independent: 'I began to feel: "Is this all there is? Is this all my life is ever going to amount to?" '
Relationship coach Francine Kaye says Sarah's experience is common: 'Once the children are grown-up, more and more people are thinking: "Our marriage has done everything it was set up to do - it's given us both stability and security, and we've successfully raised our family. Now it is time for me." '
The majority of women who divorce in later life, she says, are trying to retrieve their identity.
'So many women say to me: "I wanted to find out if I still exist." They felt consumed by both their marriage and by bringing up children. They often feel resentful that their husbands have invested so much effort in their work and so little time in them.
'There is less compulsion to stick things out today. In the post-war generation, marriage was much more about economic survival and divorce was still stigmatised. Now, material wealth has freed us to make more self-interested decisions.'
It's a view that's all too familiar to Margaret White, who has put her £420,000 five-bedroom marital home on the market after calling time on her 52-year marriage to Peter.
A bachelor again: Tony Davey, now 57, blames his commitment to his career for the failure of his marriage
'There's no one else involved. I just want to live on my own to be able to do exactly what I want to do, go where I want to go, have a holiday. I want to decide when I want to eat and what I want to eat - not worry about someone else.
'I was brought up to believe marriage was for ever, but I was never told it could be so boring, particularly once he retires and is suddenly under your feet every minute of every day.'
Margaret and Peter have two grownup children - Dan, 50, and Becky, 43 - and five grandchildren.
Two years ago she and Peter, 71, celebrated their golden wedding anniversary with a trip to the Grand Canyon and a party for their close friends and family. Peter retired as a City of London stonemason seven years ago and expected to live out his final years with his wife in their dream home, which nestles alongside their stables in ten acres of remote Welsh countryside.
'Women of my age are no longer prepared to endure immature men who erode our self-esteem'
But Margaret has other ideas: 'I managed to put up with it until he retired, but it's been worse since he's been here all the time. He's happy to lie on the floor watching the TV. He doesn't want to go and do things.
'I've um-ed and ah-ed about this for years, but I'm done with the dutiful wife bit. I've done it for too long.'
They met when they were both living in London and Margaret was still at school. They married when they were 19, shortly after Peter was called up for National Service.
'Those first few years were like one long honeymoon because he was in the Army,' she says. 'He only had a week's leave and then he went away for six months.
'It was all new. Neither of us had ever had sex with anybody else so we learnt about it together, which wasn't very much; sex was never brilliant. But the children came along, and you wouldn't dream of leaving when you had young children.'
Now, though, as with so many other couples, the children are long gone and Margaret finds she has nothing in common with the man who has shared her life for so long.
For Trisha Watson, 57, from Barrowford, Lancashire, the decision to split from John, her husband of 34 years, has been liberating. 'I'm thoroughly enjoying my freedom. I have time and money to do exactly what I want, instead of having to worry about a man all the time. It's a relief,' she confesses.
Fell out of love: Sarah Partington, now 61, divorced her husband Thomas after their children moved out and they found they had nothing to talk about
'I've changed everything about myself, from my hair to the way I dress,' she says. But she concedes it takes courage and a degree of dynamism to leave a marriage.
'It has taken quite a while to find my feet. No one comes out of a long marriage without a lot of emotional wear and tear. My husband was a very forceful person, and I had quite low self-esteem. It's taken me a while to blossom,' she says.
Trisha and John lived and worked together, running a business, but eventually 'grew apart'.
'John felt that I no longer understood him or his needs and I thought he was acting like a big baby. I just got fed up,' is how Trisha puts it.
'People said: "But you've been together so long," as if that were justification for staying together'
'I think women of my age are no longer prepared to endure immature men who erode our self-esteem. People change, and in the latter years of my marriage I felt I was looking at a man I no longer knew.' And what of the families of this new breed of mature divorcees? Although there are no bemused young children to feel bereft by their parents' separation or truculent teenagers to be appeased and accommodated, adult sons and daughters are not immune.
Trisha and John have three children and their allegiances are divided. John was not invited to his daughter Kathryn's wedding; it was Trisha who took the role traditionally assumed by a father and gave their daughter away.
Neither was Sarah prepared for the difficulty of negotiating the social minefield that family events involving her ex would become. 'It's been really difficult,' she says sadly.
'The children have found it hard, although Thomas and I do our best to be civil and have sat at the same table at family parties.'
Are Sarah and Trisha convinced that it was worth sacrificing family unity, companionship, material comforts and the multitude of shared experiences a long marriage brings for their independence? Apparently so.
'I'm sure I made the right decision - I shudder at the thought of still being in that house getting the silent treatment - but divorce is never easy,' confesses Sarah. 'I miss being part of a big family. I miss all the memories associated with our marital home. I keep very busy, but coming back to an empty house is lonely.'
Who knew?
The oldest couple to divorce are Bertie and Jessie Wood, from Cornwall, who split in 2009 aged 98 and after 36 years of marriageFifty-seven-year-old Tony Davey from Bognor Regis, West Sussex, readily admits that his consuming commitment to his career was a prime reason for the failure of his 31-year marriage.
'I was working 60 or 70-hour weeks in charge of commercial sales for a large firm,' he says. 'I simply wasn't there while our three children were growing up, and my wife was resentful. She said it takes two to make a marriage and that I was not pulling my weight. I felt that I was doing my bit by supporting the family financially.
'People said: "But you've been together so long," as if that were justification for staying together. And I think I probably would have kept at the marriage for longer if my wife hadn't been so insistent about splitting up.'
So Tony finds himself a bachelor again as he approaches 60. 'It's tough,' he says. 'I've moved home and changed my job. I miss the big Victorian home where we raised our family, but I live by the sea now and have opted out of the rat race. I now describe myself as an ageing hippy.'
Tony has shrugged off his corporate identity to pursue a passion (he now services and customises electric guitars), traded the comfort of a large family home for the relative austerity of a two-bed rented flat and the familiarity of a marriage for life on his own.
Is it a fair exchange? 'I miss my children very much. I miss being part of a family,' he admits. 'I find myself sitting and crying at romantic old films on the television. When an elderly couple walks hand-in-hand into the sunset, I think: "That's not going to happen to me," and, if I'm honest, it's a profound regret.'