@fmf said
You described him as a man delirious with himself because he has a disproportionate sense of the importance of his own thoughts, ideas and the noise he makes. They are your words. Verbatim.
I wasn't describing Beethoven. I was giving my opinion of the "adage" in your OP. And what you said above is not verbatim of what I said. It is only a part of what I said, and it's a mischaracterization of my intent, which was to answer the question you posed.
"What do you think of Ludwig van Beethoven's adage?"
My reply: "Supercilious. Like most of what I hear coming out of men's mouths. A lot of sound with little substance. A word mask that hides a man delirious with himself because he has a disproportionate sense of the importance of his own thoughts, ideas and the noise he makes."
I stand by it.
"Beethoven is widely considered one of the greatest, if not the single greatest, composer of all time. Beethoven's body of musical compositions stands with William Shakespeare's plays at the outer limits of human brilliance.
And the fact Beethoven composed his most beautiful and extraordinary music while deaf is an almost superhuman feat of creative genius, perhaps only paralleled in the history of artistic achievement by John Milton writing Paradise Lost while blind."
I have no beef with the man, just that pithy quote.