Born: 9th December 1944 (as Eric A Saward)
Episodes Broadcast: 1981-1986

Eric Saward was born in Abingdon, Berkshire. A series of odd jobs eventually led to employment as an English teacher, during which Saward tried to establish himself as a writer. When he found little success with his prose efforts, Saward remembered listening to BBC Radio while working at a Dutch oil refinery and decided to try his hand at audio drama. He was soon writing regularly for radio, and had left his teaching position by 1974 to become a full-time scriptwriter. In 1980, Doctor Who script editor Christopher H Bidmead sought recommendations for new writers to approach, and Saward's radio colleagues put his name forward. The result was The Visitation for Peter Davison's first season as the Fifth Doctor in 1982. Saward reused his detective character Richard Mace, who had appeared in several of his radio plays.

By early 1981, Bidmead had left Doctor Who and was succeeded on an interim basis by Antony Root. Still a trainee, Root would be moving to another programme for three months, and so Saward agreed to take his place. At the time, it was believed that Root would return to Doctor Who, but he later had a change of heart and Saward's appointment was made permanent. Both men shared the script editor's credit on A Girl's Best Friend, the pilot episode for a proposed K·9 And Company spin-off series. Root was still credited as the script editor on Saward's second serial, Earthshock, to avoid the appearance of contravening the BBC's policy against script editors commissioning themselves. Three more adventures would follow over the next three years, either by taking advantage of the annual gap between Saward's contracts or, in the case of 1985's Attack Of The Cybermen, by instead commissioning his then-girlfriend, Paula Woolsey.

In 1985, Saward wrote the Doctor Who radio play Slipback

By this time, Saward's relationship with producer John Nathan-Turner had begun a slow deterioration, with his disagreement about the casting of Colin Baker as the Sixth Doctor being a notable sore point. Matters were exacerbated by the BBC's decision to postpone Doctor Who's 1986 season by eight months and jettison all of the scripts in progress. In the interim, Saward wrote the Doctor Who radio play Slipback, but struggled to find common ground with Nathan-Turner as they developed the fourteen-part epic The Trial Of A Time Lord, which would now comprise the entirety of Season Twenty-Three.

By early 1986, Saward was working from home as much as possible. He was aghast to learn that Bonnie Langford had been hired to play new companion Melanie Bush, and disliked Nathan-Turner's recruitment of Pip and Jane Baker to write some of the season. He finally submitted his resignation from Doctor Who, although he agreed to continue working with his friend, Robert Holmes, on the concluding segment of The Trial Of A Time Lord. Sadly, Saward was then dealt a terrible blow when Holmes passed away. Saward agreed to finish the saga in line with Holmes' intended storyline, but Nathan-Turner had second thoughts about a planned cliffhanger ending, and Saward angrily withdrew permission for the use of his ideas. The dispute soon became public when Saward provided a scathing interview to the science-fiction magazine Starburst.

Saward would not return to television, although he remained a prolific writer for radio. He also novelised all of his Doctor Who scripts, including Slipback, although his two Dalek stories were delayed until 2019 due to issues involving the estate of Dalek creator Terry Nation. In 2004, Saward contributed a short story to the Short Trips: Past Tense anthology from Big Finish Productions. In 2020, he ventured into the comic book medium with Lytton; published by Cutaway Comics, it starred the mercenary character Saward had originally created for Resurrection Of The Daleks. Briefly married during his time in the Netherlands, Saward subsequently began a relationship with Jane Judge, who had been the production secretary for Doctor Who during his time on the show.