Ashtavakra is a name that appears in indian lore, but almost certainly he did not write it. What is ashtavakra gita the ashtavakra gita illuminates an ancient conversation between the sage ashtavakra and janaka, a king with both worldly responsibilities and deep spiritual questioning about the nature of reality. Wisdom commentaries ashtavakra gita the art of living. Ashtavakra gita presents a rather imaginary conversation or dialogue between an ancient sage named ashtavakra and a famous historic king named janaka about the nature of self, reality, selfrealization and liberation. The yoga sutras, dhammapada, heart sutra, ashtavakra gita. It is written as a dialogue between the sage ashtavakra and janaka, king of mithila. Unless you have a translated copy of the gita on hand, this book is by itself is not enough.
Sri ramakrishna persuaded narendra to read ashtavakra gita which had a stupendous impact on the young devotee who later flowered into swami vivekananda, the doughty advaitic evangelist. Ashtavakra gita or the song of ashtavakra is a dialogue between sage ashtavakra and king janaka on the nature of soul, reality and bondage. Bhagavan has also made other references to this great book. Ashtavakra gita is a classical advaita vedanta scripture. People often assume that the historical ashtavakra or somebody who used his name as a pseudonym is the author of this poem. The author, likely an anonymous sage, merely use s the characters of ashtavakra and king janaka to set up a classic dialogue between guru and disciple.
The commentary is fine, but sri ravi shankar leaves the gita untranslated which is absurd. It offers an extremely radical version of nondualistic. Commentaries on ashtavakra gita is a collection of 8 questions asked by a seekers when they were not able to relate the verses of ashtavakra gita in their daily living. By that same logic, shakespeares play henry v was written by henry v.