Born: 4th May 1935
Died: 13th April 2017 (aged 81 years)
Episodes Broadcast: 1984

Eric Pringle was born in Morpeth, Northumberland and graduated from Nottingham University with an honours degree in English. After working for an insurance company, he established himself as a writer of radio drama. Pringle also had a brief period of success on television in the early Seventies, scripting episodes of Pretenders, Kate and The Carnforth Practice, in addition to several plays. In 1975, he began developing a Doctor Who serial called “The Angarath” for Tom Baker's Fourth Doctor, but it was not taken forward by the production office. However, Pringle remained a regular viewer of Doctor Who, and he was encouraged to continue developing ideas for the programme by his agent, Peter Bryant, who had produced Doctor Who in the late Sixties.

In 1981, Pringle submitted two new ideas to Doctor Who script editor Eric Saward. “The Darkness”, which apparently featured the Daleks, was not pursued. However, the second proposal eventually made it to the screen as 1983's The Awakening, with Peter Davison as the Fifth Doctor. This was Pringle's last television credit. In addition to his work for radio, he also novelised The Awakening for Target Books and published several works for children, starting with Big George in 2001.

Pringle had a son, David, and a daughter, Susannah, with his first wife, Patricia. Following her death, he married Jenny Barr in 2011. Pringle successfully battled oral cancer late in life, but died of lung congestion on April 13th, 2017.