Maharishi Mahesh Yogi: The Biography of the Man Who Gave Transcendental Meditation to the World

Paul Mason's biography of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi is a substantially researched independent account of the Transcendental Meditation founder's life, drawing on what the author describes as previously unpublished and scarce material gathered over years of dedicated research into a figure whose own organization has controlled much of the publicly available biographical narrative. Its value is real independence from the movement's own authorized materials, a rare quality for Maharishi biography. Mason is an independent researcher rather than an academic historian, and the book has not undergone the peer review a university press biography would receive, so specific factual claims, particularly around contested and thinly documented early biographical details, are worth weighing against other independent journalistic and scholarly treatments of the Transcendental Meditation movement's history.