Eric Pringle (5 April 1935,
Morpeth, Northumberland,
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe ...
– 13 April 2017,
Ledbury,
Herefordshire
Herefordshire () is a county in the West Midlands of England, governed by Herefordshire Council. It is bordered by Shropshire to the north, Worcestershire to the east, Gloucestershire to the south-east, and the Welsh counties of Monmouthshire ...
)
Writers' Guild of Great Britain
/ref> was a British writer for radio
Radio is the technology of signaling and communicating using radio waves. Radio waves are electromagnetic waves of frequency between 30 hertz (Hz) and 300 gigahertz (GHz). They are generated by an electronic device called a transm ...
and television
Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication Media (communication), medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of Transmission (telecommunications), television tra ...
. He also wrote three novels for children.
He was one of the writers of the 1972 television series '' Pretenders'', and of the 1974 series '' The Carnforth Practice''.
In 1975, he was commissioned by then-'' Doctor Who'' script editor Robert Holmes to pen a two-part serial entitled ''The Angurth'' for the programme's thirteenth season. This was eventually abandoned, but in 1981, Pringle was encouraged by his agent, former ''Who'' producer Peter Bryant, to submit new material for the show. Pringle delivered two proposals for four-part stories to the production office in August, one called ''The Darkness'' (possibly featuring the Daleks) and another entitled ''War Game''. Script editor Eric Saward finally responded to Pringle, and in 1982, Pringle was asked to put together a scene breakdown for ''War Game''.
By 1983, War Game had been rechristened '' The Awakening'' (and may also have been called ''Poltergeist'' at some point). Saward and producer John Nathan-Turner had also come to the realisation that the story did not merit four episodes, and so Pringle was asked to condense it down to fit the two-part slot for Season Twenty-One. Pringle concurred and performed the necessary rewrites by April. Saward was still not satisfied with Pringle's modifications; consequently, he elected to heavily rewrite ''The Awakening''. Pringle was not particularly pleased with Saward's rewrites, believing they made the story confusing and rushed. ''The Awakening'' would be his only contribution to ''Doctor Who''.
Much of Pringle's more recent work has been for the radio including adaptations of '' The Wolves of Willoughby Chase'' and J. B. Priestley's ''The Good Companions
''The Good Companions'' is a novel by the English author J. B. Priestley.
Written in 1929, it follows the fortunes of a concert party on a tour of England. It is Priestley's most famous novel and established him as a national figure. It wo ...
''. His 2001 BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC that replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. It broadcasts a wide variety of Talk radio, spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history fro ...
play ''Hymus Paradisi'' about the life of composer Herbert Howells
Herbert Norman Howells (17 October 1892 – 23 February 1983) was an English composer, organist, and teacher, most famous for his large output of Anglican church music.
Life
Background and early education
Howells was born in Lydney, Glouces ...
won a Sony Award. That year also saw the publication of his children's novel ''Big George''. This has been followed by two sequels ''Big George and the Seventh Knight'' and ''Big George and the Winter King''. The ''Big George'' books are a retelling of the Saint George and the Dragon myth with a science fiction
Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imagination, imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, Paral ...
twist.
References
External links
*
Eric Pringle radio plays
{{DEFAULTSORT:Pringle, Eric
British children's writers
British television writers
People from Morpeth, Northumberland
Writers from Northumberland
1935 births
2017 deaths