Not many people know about the George Roerich - Gendun Chomphel connection (I didn’t find any mention in any of the links you posted.)
From Donald Lopez’s book, “The Madman’s Middle Way”: (Apologies for the long quote)
[quote]While in India, Roerich founded the Urusvati Himalayan Research Institute (in Kulu, Himachal Pradesh), and it was there that GC worked with George Roerich on the laborious translation of the Blue Annals, written by ’Gos lo tsa ba gzhon nu dpal in 1476. It is a worked filled with the names of persons, places, and texts that would have been impossible to identify without the assistance of an erudite Tibetan scholar. GC provided such assistance, which Roerich noted in a single sentence in the preface: “It has been a source of much satisfaction to me that I was able to discuss the entire translation with the Rev. dGe-’dun Chos-’phel, the well-known Tibetan scholar, and I gratefully acknowledge here his very helpful guidance.” By portraying GC both as a collaborator with whom to discuss the work and as a teacher who would guide it, Roerich’s brief acknowledgment suggests his own ambivalence concerning the appropriate form in which to recognize GC’s role. [color=#0000FF]Given both the technical difficulty and the extent of the text (the translation and scholarly apparatus fill almost thirteen hundred pages of fine print), it is difficult to imagine that GC’s name should not have appeared on the title page perhaps as coauthor.[/color],
The Roerich family was wealthy by the standards of the day, and GC was paid for his work. But he suffered periods of great poverty during his years in India, especially while in Calcutta, immediately after his work with Roerich. According to his friend Rak ra bkras mthong, a portion of a poem that GC wrote at this time describes his experience of collaborating with Roerich. The relevant stanzas may include the following:
Made to compile all the games of lies and deception,
Because my worldly aspirations were accomplished with so much toil,
After waiting such a long time, it turned into nothing, just deceit.
So three years of miserable labor have finally worn me down.
When you are rich, they slink up close;
When you are poor, they scorn you with pointed fingers from afar.
To consider the nature of [color=#0000FF]bad friends who do not know how to be kind to the kind[/color]
Is an occasion for tears and laughter.[/quote]
I suspect that Gendun Chomphel was poor not because he had not been well paid by Roerich, but because he had spent all his money on Calcutta whores.