Born in Buxton, Derbyshire in 1929, Spriggs had an unhappy childhood. She studied at the Royal College of Music and taught speech and drama in Coventry. Her first marriage at 21 was a disaster and, in what she called "the most painful decision of my life", left her husband and young daughter to pursue her acting dream. "The Desire to act was like a weight within me", she later said, "and I knew if I didn't do anything about it, it would destroy me". She wrote to a repertory in Stockport, Cheshire, asking for a job and was taken on. She worked with many companies, including Birmingham and Bristol, before joining the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) in 1962.