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In a mezzanine loft in a Bombay tenement, eight feet by twelve and later enlarged, a retired seller of bidis answered questions twice a day in Marathi. Nisargadatta Maharaj never set out to write books; almost everything under his name is a conversation someone else taped, translated and edited. The first of those, I Am That, came out in two volumes in 1973 after larger publishers turned it down, and within a few years visitors from Europe and America were climbing the wooden stairs in Khetwadi. The editors who followed, among them Jean Dunn and Robert Powell, worked from tapes made in his last years, when he was ill with throat cancer. This guide covers every book in order, who made each one, where to start, and how the talks became books.
By Lisanne Swart · 10 key books · 1963–2020 · Updated October 2026
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Quick answer
There are 10 key books of Nisargadatta Maharaj’s writing and talks, from Self-Knowledge and Self-Realisation (1963) to The Earliest Discourses (2020), and 8 more collections and companion books. All but the first are transcripts of talks given in Marathi and edited by others, so the editor’s name tells you as much as the title. Below is who made each one, and which belong together.
Where to Start with Nisargadatta Maharaj
If you want the book that made his name
→ I Am That (1973).
If you want short talks to read one at a time
→ Seeds of Consciousness (1982).
If you want his last teaching, recorded in 1980 and 1981
→ Prior to Consciousness (1985).
If you want to hear him before the Western visitors came
→ The Earliest Discourses (2020).
10 Key Nisargadatta Maharaj Books, in Order
Self-Knowledge and Self-Realisation
The only book here that began as his own writing rather than a recorded conversation. He wrote it in Marathi as Atmagnyana and Paramatmayoga; Vasudeo Madhav Kulkarni, a professor at Elphinstone College in Bombay, translated it, and the English version came out on 8 April 1963 with a foreword by Ram Narayan Chavhan. It is a devotional text in short sections, on divine vision, the Gayatri hymn and the stages of the seeker, and reads as a love song to his guru. The American disciple Jean Dunn later made a more readable version, but printed only 100 copies.
I Am That
101 conversations, each about four pages long, recorded in his small room in Bombay. Maurice Frydman sat in on most sessions, brought in a tape recorder for the important exchanges, and then deciphered and translated each tape from the Marathi; Sudhakar S. Dikshit edited the text. Chetana in Bombay published it in two hardcover volumes in 1973, after larger publishers had turned it down, and a revised one-volume edition followed in 1976 with Frydman’s epilogue on “Nisarga Yoga”. Visitors from abroad began arriving in such numbers that he said his home had become “a railway station platform”.
Seeds of Consciousness
The first of three books of talks edited by Jean Dunn, an American who sat with him for years, published by the Acorn Press in Durham, North Carolina. It is taken entirely from the daily talks in his Bombay flat during 1979 and 1980, and Dunn chose the clearest of them, the ones least weighed down by technical Hindu terms. Ramesh S. Balsekar, one of his interpreters, is credited among the contributors, and later editors worked from the same group of translators.
Prior to Consciousness
Dunn’s second book begins with the talk of 4 April 1980, in the last eighteen months of his life. Miss N. Vanaja taped the question-and-answer sessions; the preface names the interpreters, among them S. K. Mullarpattan, Dr D. Doongaji and Ramesh S. Balsekar. The preface also records that he kept to his daily routine as his body weakened and declined treatment, saying it was for the body and offered no guarantee of eternal life.
The Nectar of Immortality
The earliest of the three books of talks edited by Robert Powell, published by Element Books in Shaftesbury in 1987 as The Nectar of the Lord’s Feet. Blue Dove Press reissued it in 2001 under its present title; the current North Atlantic Books paperback runs to 224 pages. The publisher’s description calls him “an ordinary family man” who drew disciples from all over the world to “his humble loft in the tenements of Bombay”.
The Ultimate Medicine
The second of Powell’s three books, first published by Blue Dove Press in San Diego in 1994, with a foreword by the physician Peter Madill. Its publisher pitches it at “serious students” rather than those who like their spirituality “watered down”. Among the subjects is morality: in these talks, good conduct comes naturally to someone freed from self-centred bondage, while society’s rules are relative and can distract from liberation.
Consciousness and the Absolute
The last of Dunn’s three books, again from the Acorn Press, and the close of the taped series that Prior to Consciousness began. The recordings run to 1 July 1981, about two months before his death, and Dunn transcribed them while he was in great pain. The talks turn on one distinction: consciousness, which depends on the body, and the formless awareness he called the Absolute.
The Experience of Nothingness
The final volume of Powell’s trilogy, first published by Blue Dove Press in 1996. The title comes from a chapter in which he follows a visitor’s logical argument relentlessly to its end. The book’s point, in its publisher’s words, is that logic and spirituality “do not necessarily stand in opposition”: reasoning should be pursued rigorously until thought itself is left behind.
Beyond Freedom
Built from ten audio cassettes of talks from his last two years that had sat, unpublished, with the interpreter Saumitra Mullarpattan. Maria Jory transcribed them over several months while Chaitan and Neela Balsekar translated the Marathi, and Yogi Impressions in Mumbai published the result in 2007. Jory’s editorial notes are dated October 2006; a German translation followed from Lotus-Press.
The Earliest Discourses
The earliest teaching on record, published by Zen Publications in Mumbai in 2020 and edited by Shankarrao B. Daygude and Dinkar Kshirsagar. He began speaking in the early 1950s, at first on popular Marathi scriptures such as Eknath’s Bhagwat and Ramdas’s Dasbodh; these discourses date from 1954 to 1956, nearly twenty years before I Am That. They show the teacher before the question-and-answer sessions with Western visitors that made him known.
How Many Books Has Nisargadatta Maharaj Written?
Ten books are listed here in full and eight more below, eighteen in all. Counts elsewhere differ because he wrote only one book himself: the rest are talks taped and edited by different people, some reissued under new titles, such as The Nectar of the Lord’s Feet, now The Nectar of Immortality.
- The book that made his name — I Am That Read the entries →
- Jean Dunn’s three — Seeds of Consciousness, Prior to Consciousness, Consciousness and the Absolute Read the entries →
- Robert Powell’s three — The Nectar of Immortality, The Ultimate Medicine, The Experience of Nothingness Read the entries →
- Earliest and rediscovered — Self-Knowledge and Self-Realisation, Beyond Freedom, The Earliest Discourses Read the entries →
- Later collections and companions — Gleanings from Nisargadatta, I Am Unborn, Pointers from Nisargadatta Maharaj and more See the list →
In What Order to Read Nisargadatta Maharaj
I Am That comes first for most readers: it is the longest record, covers the most ground and is the book the others assume you know. Frydman, who became his disciple in 1965, recorded it in the years before 1973, well before the illness that shadows the later books.
Two groups belong together. Jean Dunn’s books run in sequence, and Prior to Consciousness and Consciousness and the Absolute follow the taped talks from April 1980 to July 1981 in date order, so read them as a pair. Robert Powell’s three were planned as a trilogy, with The Experience of Nothingness as its final volume. The Earliest Discourses and Self-Knowledge and Self-Realisation show an earlier, more devotional teacher and make most sense once the later talks are familiar.
A reading path
1. I Am That (1973)
2. Seeds of Consciousness (1982), shorter talks, chosen for clarity
3. Prior to Consciousness (1985), the last talks begin
4. Consciousness and the Absolute (1994), straight after it
5. The Experience of Nothingness (1996)
6. The Earliest Discourses (2020), for the teacher of the 1950s
Everything Else Nisargadatta Maharaj Published: The Full List
Beyond the 10 key books: 8 more titles, grouped by form.
Open a form with the + to see every book in it.
More collections of his talks
6
6 books · 2006–2017
- 2006Gleanings from Nisargadattaedited by Mark West
- 2007I Am Unborntalks compiled by Pradeep Apte and others
- 2008The Nisargadatta Gitaedited by Pradeep Apte
- 2014Meditations with Sri Nisargadatta Maharajedited by Dinkar Kshirsagar and Suresh N. Mehta; Yogi Impressions
- 2014Nothing is Everythingedited by Mohan Gaitonde; Zen Publications
- 2017Self-Loveedited by Dinkar Kshirsagar; Zen Publications
Companion books
2
2 books · 1982–2003
- 1982Pointers from Nisargadatta Maharajhis interpreter Ramesh S. Balsekar’s account of the teaching; Chetana, Bombay
- 2003The Wisdom-Teachings of Nisargadatta Maharaja visual journey of photographs and sayings, edited by Matthew Greenblatt; Inner Directions
Quick facts about Nisargadatta Maharaj
- Born
- Maruti Shivrampant Kambli, 17 April 1897, Bombay; raised in the village of Kandalgaon
- Died
- 8 September 1981, Bombay, of throat cancer, aged 84
- Known for
- He taught, in plain Marathi and to anyone who climbed the stairs, that attending to the bare sense “I am” is enough to find out what one really is.
- Teacher
- Siddharameshwar Maharaj, whom he met in 1933 and who died in 1936
- Lineage
- The Inchegiri branch of the Navnath Sampradaya, a householder lineage
- Livelihood
- Small shops selling bidis and household goods, eight at their peak; he retired in 1966
- Where he taught
- A loft in his family’s flat in Vanmali Bhavan, 10th Lane, Khetwadi, Bombay; initiations from 1951
- Language
- Marathi only; visitors heard him through interpreters such as Ramesh S. Balsekar and S. K. Mullarpattan
How Nisargadatta Maharaj Taught: Talks in a Bombay Loft
Apart from one devotional book in Marathi, he wrote nothing for publication. The books are records of sessions held twice a day in his loft: a visitor asked, an interpreter translated, he answered in Marathi, and the answer was translated back. Maurice Frydman, a Polish-born engineer who had lived at the ashram of Mahatma Gandhi and earlier followed Ramana Maharshi, taped the exchanges that became I Am That; according to David Godman he was also the unnamed editor of Maharshi’s Gospel (1939). Later books came from tapes recorded by others and translated by a rotating group of interpreters, so the same teaching reaches English in several voices.
His own teacher, Siddharameshwar Maharaj, told him to attend to the sense “I am” and nothing else, and he made that the centre of what he taught. The early talks in The Earliest Discourses start from Marathi scripture; the later ones, after I Am That, are short, direct and often abrupt, as in the late talks recorded from 1980, where he distinguishes consciousness, which depends on the body, from the Absolute that is prior to it. He told one visitor that I Am That should not be taken as the last word, since each answer had been meant for a particular person.
I Am That is the source of nearly all his reputation outside India, and teachers including Eckhart Tolle, Wayne Dyer and Adyashanti have called it a spiritual classic. His manner in the loft was confrontational: the writer Timothy Conway records outbursts, insults and visitors being sent away. Conway also criticises some of what followed, calling the teaching of his interpreter Ramesh Balsekar flawed by a “fatalist, amoral outlook” and warning that an emphasis on negation in the later books can slide into nihilism or mere intellectualism.
Frequently asked questions about Nisargadatta Maharaj’s books
How many books has Nisargadatta Maharaj written?
He wrote only one himself, Self-Knowledge and Self-Realisation (1963), translated from Marathi. Every other book under his name is a transcript of his talks, taped, translated and edited by others. This guide lists ten key books from 1963 to 2020 and eight later collections and companion books, eighteen in all.
Which Nisargadatta Maharaj book should I read first?
I Am That (1973), 101 conversations translated from Marathi and edited by Maurice Frydman. It is the book that made him known outside India, and the later collections assume its ideas.
What was Nisargadatta Maharaj’s last book?
The last talks he gave are in Consciousness and the Absolute (1994), edited by Jean Dunn from recordings that run to 1 July 1981, about two months before his death. The most recently published book in this guide is The Earliest Discourses (2020), which collects talks from 1954 to 1956.
Who translated I Am That?
Maurice Frydman, a Polish-born engineer and former follower of Gandhi and Ramana Maharshi, who taped the conversations in Bombay and translated them from Marathi. Sudhakar S. Dikshit edited the text, and Chetana of Bombay published it in two volumes in 1973, with a revised one-volume edition in 1976.
In what order should I read the Jean Dunn books?
In the order they were published: Seeds of Consciousness (1982), from talks of 1979 and 1980, then Prior to Consciousness (1985) and Consciousness and the Absolute (1994), which together follow the taped talks from 4 April 1980 to 1 July 1981 in date order.
What are Robert Powell’s Nisargadatta books?
Three books of talks edited by Robert Powell: The Nectar of Immortality (first published in 1987 as The Nectar of the Lord’s Feet), The Ultimate Medicine (1994) and The Experience of Nothingness (1996), which its publisher calls the final volume of the trilogy.
Who was Nisargadatta Maharaj?
An Indian teacher of Advaita, born Maruti Shivrampant Kambli in 1897, who ran a small shop selling bidis in Bombay. In 1933 he met his guru, Siddharameshwar Maharaj of the Inchegiri branch of the Navnath Sampradaya, and from 1951 he taught in a loft in his flat in Khetwadi, in Marathi, until his death from throat cancer on 8 September 1981.
Footnotes
- Nisargadatta Maharaj — Wikipedia
- I Am That — Wikipedia
- Maurice Frydman — Wikipedia
- Nisargadatta, Maharaj, 1897–1981 — National Library of Israel authority record
- Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj: Life & Teachings — Timothy Conway, Enlightened Spirituality
- Self-Knowledge and Self-Realization — Enlightened Spirituality
- Remembering Nisargadatta Maharaj — David Godman
- Seeds of Consciousness — NNELS catalogue
- Prior to Consciousness and Consciousness and the Absolute, book review — RSSB Spiritual Link
- The Nectar of Immortality — Penguin Random House
- The Nectar of Immortality — North Atlantic Books
- The Ultimate Medicine — North Atlantic Books
- The Experience of Nothingness — North Atlantic Books
- Beyond Freedom, German edition reading sample — Lotus-Press
- Nisargadatta Maharaj: The Earliest Discourses — Exotic India
Bibliography last verified 7 October 2026. Where sources give different first-publication years, this page uses the year in library catalogues or the publisher’s own record.
This list was not put together by a machine.
The notes are all mine,
and the books are all his.
Lisanne x
Written by Lisanne Swart, who has curated reading lists and author guides at lisanneswart.com since 2021.
See more on her personal bookshelf.
“The world is nothing but the picture of your own “I” consciousness.”
— Nisargadatta Maharaj, Prior to Consciousness, talk of 8 April 1980
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