Free from both his marital and editorial responsibilities (having ended publication of Les Lettres Françaises — L'Humanité 's literary supplement — in 1972), Aragon was free to return to his surrealist roots. During the last ten years of his life, he published at least two further novels: Henri Matisse Roman and Les Adieux.

Louis Aragon died on 24 December, 1982, his friend Jean Ristat sitting up with him. He was buried in the parc of Moulin de Villeneuve, in his property of Saint-Arnoult-en-Yvelines, along his wife Elsa Triolet.

Various poems by Aragon have been sung by Lino Léonardi, Hélène Martin, Léo Ferré, Jean Ferrat, Georges Brassens, Alain Barrière, Isabelle Aubret, Nicole Rieu, Monique Morelli, Marc Ogeret, et al. Many of his poems put into music by Jean Ferrat have been translated into German by Didier Caesar (alias Dieter Kaiser) and are sung by his Duo.

Aragon's poetry is diverse and varied. He favoured equally poetic prose and fixed-form verse, to which he brought a renewed sensibility. After a very free early period, marked by surrealism and its subversive language, Aragon returned to more classical forms (measured verse; rhyme, even) clearly inspired by Apollinaire. He felt that this was more in keeping with the national emergency during World War II. After the war, the political side of his poetry gave way more and more to lyricism for its own sake. He never went back on that embrace of classicism. He did however integrate a certain formal freedom with it, sometimes recalling the surrealism of his early days.

As a novelist he encompasses the whole ethos of the Twentieth century: surrealist novel, socialist realism, realism, nouveau roman. Indeed he was one of the founding personalities of the novel of his time.

In 2010, La Poste (French Post Office) issued 3 stamps honoring Louis Aragon.