At certain points over the past two decades that glare has intensified for both positive and negative reasons, or subsided briefly, but either way, he has felt it throughout.

You might think that would be enough to tempt him back towards the shadows that his most recent retirement provided but, on the contrary, he missed the lights.

“I love all this,” Fury says with a wave of the hand. “The media and the turnout, this whole show, and I’m at the top of it all.”

On Saturday night, he will also start his move back towards the top of the heavyweight division when he faces Arslanbek Makhmudov at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in his first fight for 16 months.

“And they were a lovely 16 months too,” he says. “I recorded season two of "At Home With The Furys," which airs on Sunday. I also recorded a biopic documentary on my whole life from being a newborn baby to a world champion boxer as an adult. That’s going to be unbelievable.

“I managed England for UNICEF on Soccer Aid and went on a few family holidays and stuff. I’ve had a busy year or so but then it gets to a point where I just want to go back to work.”

For 37-year-old Fury, that does not just mean the fighting on Saturday but also the circus that comes with it. He sits down with The Ring in a room a few floors up The Stratford Hotel, London, a few miles east of Tottenham.

Just like always, Fury is followed by a healthy entourage but there are some notable absentees. When he spoke to The Ring at the initial press conference to launch this fight back in February, his dad John had been in the room, as had his brother Shane. Neither were there this time.

“I want to go back to work but it’s like nobody else wants me to go back to work,” he says. “My dad doesn’t support me, my wife, my brothers, nobody wants me to fight again. They all say the same thing; just forget it, you’ve done everything, enjoy your family.

“But I believe every man must carry his own cross in life and every man must do what he wants to do because life is very short. What I want to do is boxing.

“If I retired because other people told me to do so, I’m the one who has to deal with that. Nobody else, just me. Listen, when the people you love don’t want you to do it but you still do it that is hard. But they’re not the ones going in the boxing ring, it’s only me in there.”

The fight will represent the fifth return from retirement of his career and it was prepared for during a 16-week training camp in Thailand. Over the past few weeks, the Fury circus has plotted up at the Champneys resort in Tring, Hertfordshire, 30 miles outside London.

“The support I’ve got just being there was unbelievable,” he adds. “That was from young, middle-aged and old people, the full spectrum. They are telling me they remember me from the Channel 5 days so I know they must be long-time fans, that was 15 years ago. If they were 60 then they're 75 years old now.

"Everyone has watched me grow up; my entire adult life has been spent under the spotlight. It’s not hard because the positives outweigh the negatives much much more. For me, being under the spotlight and having that level of scrutiny means if I pee in a bush it’s on the back page of the newspapers. But really I don’t look at them as negatives because they say all press is good press anyway.

“Every person I meet in the street makes me happy because these are people I’ve entertained for the last 20 years or more.

“At Champneys I’ve had chats with people in jacuzzis, over breakfast, everywhere really. It’s part of who I am and what I do. The staff told me they have a lot of people stay there but they said ‘none of them are like you, Tyson.' It’s because I speak to everyone, take pictures with everyone. It’s fantastic and it’s worth it because every person puts a smile on my face.

“There are people who have probably bought a ticket or get Netflix to watch this fight so for me to disregard them wouldn’t be kind would it? All that does it lose you fans, so I try to make as much time as I can.”

For now, The Ring’s time with the two-time world heavyweight champion is done. A long list of further media obligations await before Fury can get back to Champneys.

When this particular recording stops, he looks across to his team and evaluates his performance. “I’m on fire today,” he says of the interview. “Quote after quote. I’m a quote machine.”

But he knows on Saturday night, the talking stops, and that’s what really matters.