Azmakna

i've been writing for years now, but sometimes i still have trouble coming to terms with the active and the passive voice. i thought that it would be fun for forum users (and helpful) if everyone posted a passive and active version of the same sentence. so:

i cut the rope with the knife (active)
the knife cut through the rope (passive)

lol, i'm not even sure that's right.

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Truth-Teller

Passive:
He was proud and strong in the sunlight.
Active:
He stood proud and strong in the sunlight.

Passive:
The room was cold and dark when Billy came back.
Active:
Billy walked into a cold and dark room.

Passive:
Laughter was in her throat.
Active:
She laughed.

Passive: The car was driven by John
Active: John drove the car.

Passive: The room was cleaned by Mary.
Active: Mary cleaned the room

Passive: The flower were cut by Josephine.
Active: Josephine cut the flowers.

Passive: The lights were turned on by Pearlie May.
Active: Pearlie May turned on the lights.

The meeting was interrupted by the appearance of a lion. An attempt was made to form a barricade with the furniture. Members were told to remain calm. The police were called...

Truth-Teller

Culled from your own work:

1. ‘Ordinary’ was a word that she had heard whispered behind closed doors, when the whisperer thought she slept, or at school, when the other girls caught her eavesdropping.

2. The voice of her five-year-old brother, Saul, was brittle.

3. However, her mother was down stairs in the kitchen preparing tea, and she was almost as formidable, especially when anything came between her and perfection.

4. He knew from experience that her brother was persistent.

5. Finally, there she was, framed by the doorway, the picture of innocence, and looking at an oddly muted scene.

6. Her mother was bent to Saul, her arm embracing him.

7. Saul was looking at Anaya, whose gravity had convinced him before he had finished his question.

8. The anger was soon forgotten though, a limp, uneven smile returning to his face, as he clambered back to his feet, muttering instructions to less than helpful limbs.

9. Soon the song was forgotten and all that mattered was the thought of home and the warmth of a hot meal in his belly, the moon now not the only light he could see at the horizon.

Truth-Teller

You are a horrible writer, sir, and you will never be published.

Unless you improve your writing, and stop wallowing in your mire.

Azmakna

and you, sir, are a fool. i walk all over the work you have posted... oh... er... you haven't posted anything, sorry, my mistake.

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Krim

Quite sure those aren't passive voice. It's just using was. The room was cold and dark when Billy came back is different from Billy walked into a cold, dark room; the first means there has been a change since he was there last, the second is just him entering a new room.

Though I really wouldn't use 'Laughter was in her throat', passive or not.


I may be wrong. Let me check some other sites. All I'm seeing and from what I can remember from a book on the subject, passive voice is merely:

the object was affected by the subject
(the ball was thrown by the boy)

and active is:

the subject affects the object
(the boy threw the ball)

Was is just...was. Though most people find that when you can cut it and replace it to make a stronger sentence, you should do it. But is it passive when you just use 'was'? According to my memory and these sites, no.

http://www.english-zone.com/verbs/pssvchrt.html
http://owl.english.purdue.edu/handou...g_actpass.html
http://www.wisc.edu/writing/Handbook...tivevoice.html
http://wwwnew.towson.edu/ows/activepass.htm
http://www.kentlaw.edu/academics/lrw...sive_Voice.htm

Your examples of why Azmakna's writing is 'bad' are incorrect. I can easily find you hundreds of instances of was in any professional book.

These are passive, because it's not saying who forgot it; these are pretty extreme examples and few people besides tightass nitpickers would get angry over them. Still, they can be strengthened and tightened.


The other instances are not, but the 'was' should be cut in some of the cases. And make sure your writing is tighter. Instead of saying that Saul was persistent, let his actions show he is persistent. Though from what I remember of reading 'Coat of Wings' you already do this.


If I'm wrong, someone more knowledgeable in the subject please correct me..

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"A terrible energy and strength began to grow in him. It grabbed his emotions and forged them into a solid bar of anger with one word stamped on it: revenge." - Eragon by Christopher Paolini, an international bestseller

Azmakna

Krim... LOL. like i said, fool.

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don't count me a blank page
waiting to be written on,
see me as a written page
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Krim

In answer to your original post:

That's just a change in sentence structure. The second one sounds choppy to me, though.

"The rope was cut by the knife" would be passive. Notice that it's not specified who is wielding the knife either.

__________________
"A terrible energy and strength began to grow in him. It grabbed his emotions and forged them into a solid bar of anger with one word stamped on it: revenge." - Eragon by Christopher Paolini, an international bestseller

Azmakna

cheers Krim. it's weird, i can write a good sentence and even avoid making it passive if i want, but i don't know the rules... it just sounds right to me lol

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don't count me a blank page
waiting to be written on,
see me as a written page
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dwspig2

Most people don't understand that you need a past participle and a form of hte "be" verb when you form the passive. I have a friend that insists that every time that I use "be" and all its forms that the sentence is passive. I've tried to explain it to her, but she seems incapable of comprehending this simple fact.

Azmakna

it would be great if you could post an example of its use here fella

__________________
don't count me a blank page
waiting to be written on,
see me as a written page
waiting to be photocopied.

http://www.writersbeat.com

Funwriter

I read this and realized I don't know a damn thing about writing!

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Patrick Beverley

The passive voice is when the main verb of the sentence is modified by a form of 'to be'.

So,
He was happy.
She is French.
are not passive, because although 'is' is a form of to be, it is the main verb rather than modifying it.

These are passive sentences:
The happy man was greeted by the French woman.
I was hurt by what you said.

Their active forms would be:
The French woman greeted the happy man.
What you said hurt me.

In English, the passive voice always (as far as I know) involves reversing the order of the nouns in a sentence (that is, object followed by subject) as the examples above show.

It's best used when the object of the sentence is what you want to focus on. If a character, let's call her Molly, is walking down a street and someone sees her, I could say 'A man standing in the shadows saw Molly'. But if I want to keep Molly as the main subject of the passage, I could say 'Molly was seen by a man standing in the shadows'.

I hope this helps.

boongee

I have a simple question, something I've always wondered about passive voice:

Is it wrong? Is it really incorrect? Or is it just something a writer should try to stay away from?

I can recognize the difference between passive and active voice pretty well, but I never really understood in what situations each should be used or whatever.

Patrick Beverley

It's not either. It's a perfectly permissible grammatical construction, and it can be used effectively in creative writing.

It should be used with caution, because it often over-complicates things, and lacks the directness of active voice. However, in certain situations, it absolutely is the best thing to use.