If Mozart had been drawn to tennis, he would probably have played like John McEnroe. All that flair, all that energy, all that temperament. Mozart? Perhaps violin virtuoso Nigel Kennedy is a better comparison: superb technique, an inspired balance of power with subtlety - and the odd tantrum thrown in. Three times Wimbledon Champion and four times winner of the US Open, he has also made more Davis Cup appearances than he can remember. Playing for his country was always important, "I'm an American," he says matter-of-factly. "I was happy to be asked to play."
It's too easy to allow his on-court antics to obscure the fact that the mercurial McEnroe remains one of the game's greats - anyone who watched the 1984 Wimbledon Final will recall how he not only humbled Jimmy Connors 6-1, 6-1, 6-2, but silenced his critics, and above all, his temperament. This supremacy was compounded two months' later by his straight set defeat of Czech-born American Ivan Lendl in the final of the US Open. Other players would have been thrilled with the double, but for McEnroe the fact that earlier that summer he had allowed a two-set lead over Lendl in the French Open final slip from his grasp, was still sticking in his throat. Perhaps it still does.
Now 41 and a concerned father of six, the erstwhile superbrat approaches this interview with a resigned "let's get this over with", adding, while looking at his watch, that he will be going over to the court at a "quarter of four". Not even a cheerful "Happy birthday" brings more than a little smile to his world-weary face. Admittedly he must be jet-lagged, but years on the tennis circuit must confer its own resilience. And resilient he is. Who would have thought that the stormy John McEnroe who first emerged in Wimbledon an amateur in 1977 would have lasted so long?
His arrival in Dublin this week is due to his involvement in the Tournament of Champions at the Point this weekend. He has been in Dublin before: "I sure have, but I can't say I know the place." His once frizzy mess of hair is now a subdued grey crop, cut tight to his head. About six feet in height and never a particularly athletic specimen, he has a slight build, with shoulders that look as if they have lifted very few weights. He confirms this. McEnroe's training has always been dominated by playing tennis. When not on court he rides a bike, and now, more than ever, he relies on mobility: stretching and loosening exercises. The pouting "You can not be serious" face looks longer and thinner. Although there is no doubting he is a man of immense humour - he's not a New Yorker for nothing - and charm, his quizzical interview demeanour is suspended somewhere between "let me out of here" and "I've said all this before, millions of times".
McEnroe the athlete only became obvious when in flight on the court, achieving the impossible thanks to a creative mind and a supple left wrist. If there was a secret to his game aside from the obvious flair, there was an unpredictability. "Unpredictability? No, I would say it was predictable. I knew what I was doing. A lot of my tennis training went on in my head. Sitting in a hotel room I would imagine scenarios. The mental preparation was a big part of it." Although he is still playing, and says "tennis is a big part of my life", when asked about McEnroe the player he invariably retreats to the past tense.
Having retired in December 1992 at 33, he is back playing, or rather, still playing. The idea behind these tournaments, he says, "is to bring these old farts together and see if they can still play". They (Bjorn Borg, Pat Cash, Henri Leconte) can still play - McEnroe stresses these are competitive matches, not exhibitions, and he says of his fellow "old farts" that together they can return to the men's game a quality it has certainly been missing of late - "personality".
He seems committed to the sport without being obsessive. He never trained with Lendl's near-religious dedication. When asked if fitness is a problem for him at this stage, McEnroe replies: "Fitness was always a problem". But he played many five-set matches. Few world-class singles players also played as many top-class doubles; his partnership with Peter Fleming produced many classic victories, including four Wimbledon doubles titles.
Asked about his time out of the game, McEnroe says he took seven months off in 1986. The absence seemed longer. "Well, maybe my performances were down. I took time off then because I had just had my first baby. Maybe I came back too soon." Whatever the reason, he does not seem too interested. McEnroe married actress Tatum O'Neill, daughter of Ryan, in August 1986. Their second child was born the following year. He continued playing. Did it affect the marriage? "I can't say any one thing did, lots of things did." How bad was the divorce? "I don't know - how you can describe these things? It was as bad as divorces are." Of his first marriage he says: "We were together from 1986 to 1992, my daughter Emily was born in 1991. I've been with my second wife for five and a half years. And I have another two sons and a step-daughter."
Early into the conversation, McEnroe says that people were always more interested in: "Why is this guy yelling?". Even he doesn't seem to have the answer to that one. When I suggest that perhaps he is the sort of person who would have yelled if he played the piano, he glances at me briefly and says: "I don't think so".