The passive voice is a verb form where the subject is the recipient of the action performed by the verb. For instance, “I was born on a Saturday.”
In English, most sentences adhere to the subject-verb-object structure, commonly referred to as the active voice. An example of this is, “I love you.” In this case, the subject is “I,” the verb is “love,” and the object is “you.” Here, the subject executes the action of the verb.
However, there are instances when the subject is acted upon or receives the action of the verb. This scenario is known as the passive voice. Consider a situation where someone has stolen your wallet, and you are unaware of the perpetrator. You might express this by saying, “My wallet was stolen.” In this passive construction, “my wallet” serves as the subject, while “was stolen” functions as the verb. There is no direct object present—the wallet did not perform the action of stealing. The speaker remains oblivious to the identity of the thief.
To construct the passive voice, one must utilize a form of the verb “be” followed by a past participle. The passive can be formed across various verb tenses, although the simple present and simple past are the most frequently used.
Only transitive verbs are capable of being used in the passive voice. In contrast, intransitive verbs, which do not accept a direct object, cannot be rendered in the passive form. For example, one cannot say, “I was arrived by train,” as the intransitive verb “arrive” cannot be followed by an object.
In most instances, it is advisable for users to refrain from utilizing the passive voice. The use of passive voice can render the speaker or writer as indirect and lacking in strength. Which phrase would you prefer to hear: “I love you” (active voice) or “You are loved by me” (passive voice)?
However, there are certain circumstances in which the passive voice should be employed.
The primary reason for using the passive voice is when the doer of the action is either unknown or deemed unimportant. For instance, one might say, “My visa was processed,” “My shoes were made in India,” or “The car was imported from Germany.” In these instances, it is not essential to identify precisely who executed the action.
At times, speakers may opt for the passive voice even when they are aware of the individual responsible for the action. In such cases, the word “by” should be included, followed by the actor.
For example, one might state, “Great Expectations was written by Charles Dickens.” Alternatively, the active voice could be used: “Charles Dickens wrote Great Expectations.” Both constructions are grammatically correct. The passive voice places emphasis on the book, while the active voice highlights the author.
.In casual conversation, the verb “be” may be substituted with the verb “get.” For instance, rather than stating “I was hit by a car,” one could say, “I got hit by a car.” Pay attention to this well-known song by the Eurythmics. You will encounter two active sentences and two passive sentences.
Occasionally, influential individuals seek to acknowledge a mistake without attributing blame to specific persons. In such instances, they frequently employ the passive expression “mistakes were made.” Listen to a television interview featuring President Obama. A journalist inquired about a report concerning abuses by the Central Intelligence Agency. Here is President Obama’s response:
“Any fair-minded person looking at this would say that some terrible mistakes were made.”
Additionally, here is President George W. Bush utilizing the same expression. A journalist questioned him regarding the dismissal of certain prosecutors.
“And he’s right, mistakes were made. And I’m frankly not happy about them.”
How to Write in the Active Voice Vs the Passive Voice
Is your writing slow? Do your readers have to slog through your words in order to get the meaning? Is your writing without passion? Are your readers going to sleep by the end of your story? Is your writing long winded and ultra formal sounding?
Then you may be suffering from passive vox syndrome!
But don’t worry. Curing your writing of the passive voice is relatively easy and straight forward. Just send…
Okay, time to change to a more serious tone. Writing in an active voice is generally considered to be better than writing in passive voice. There are many reasons for this. Most of those reasons have to do with either the readability or the emotional connection of the two writing styles.
That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t write in the passive voice. But like a spice it should be used with a delicate hand. Or typewriter or whatever you use to write with.
First off, the active voice is where the subject performs the action defined by the verb on the subject. The passive voice is the reverse. Clear as mud? How this… a writer writes with an active voice. On the other hand, the passive voice is written by the writer. The writer writes both but you’ll notice that he (or she) is the subject in the first and the object in the second.
So how do you write in the active voice?
The simplest answer is to always keep focus on who is doing the acting. Think of yourself as the camera operator.
Who is the main actor in the scene? Focus on what they are doing. If your hero is the focus then they need to be the subject when action occurs. Your hero punches the villain. If the focus then switches to a response — the villain punches the hero back — you need to change the focus to the other party. If your focus is always on showing the person acting then you’ll naturally write in an active voice.
So you’ve already written your book or story or whatever you’re doing. And now you’ve been told you should have written it in active voice.
How do you switch a piece of writing from passive voice to active voice?
Start by scanning for “by” verbs. Those are verbs that are followed by the word “by”. They aren’t always passive but it’s pretty common. Then search for the “be” verbs. You know the ones where the verb is preceded by “be”, “was”, “is” or “are”. “His shoes were being put on by him” is a good example where both these tests work.
Chances are, when you finish rewriting these sentences your writing will be active enough to be acceptable.
Then try rewriting the sentence to put the subject first. “He put on his shoes” to use the previous example. You may find you need to restructure the sentence or phrase. That’s okay. One of the benefits of active sentences is that they are shorter.
Try this quiz to test your mastery of the active and passive voice.
