We need to talk! This is something we need to get out in the open. Passive voice appears way too often in the Art of Writing creative writing retreat early texts. Sitting there meekly, quietly in those initial first draft manuscripts, it’s a pesky beast, that passive voice. A beginner writer can be pegged immediately from their use of passive voice. I remember Stephen King banging on about it in his wonderful book On Writing, which unfortunately has no Index otherwise he would be quoted here.
To give credit where credit is due, the idea for a blog on passive voice came to me while listening to Joanna Penn’s podcast with editor Kristen Tate. On Joanna’s podcast the discussion centred around how human editors will always be needed and why. But a tool, like ProWriting Aid, will always pick up passive voice. My ears perked up all over Piazzale Michelangelo and my morning walk picked up pace.
Kristen Tate said, “But one thing that I think ProWriting Aid is very good at flagging is passive voice.” ( This is when I perked).
She went onto say: “Yes. I think the thing to know there is that sometimes you really do need passive voice. There's a reason that we have this construction. A good example might be a sentence like, ‘A red Maserati was parked in the driveway. So, if I'm a character and I'm pulling up to my home and there's this red Maserati I've never seen before parked in my driveway, I don't know who parked it there. And that's actually part of the mystery of the sentence. So that sentence really does need to be in passive voice because the important information there is the red Maserati and we've got it upfront. So, there are things like that, that you don't want to change.”
Or John Gardner in The Art of Fiction explains it well too: Except in stock locutions, such as “You were paid yesterday,” “The Germans were defeated,” or “The project was abandoned,” the passive voice is virtually useless in fiction except when used for comic effect, as when the writer mimics some fool’s slightly pompous way of speaking or quotes some institutional directive. The active voice is almost invariably more direct and vivid: “Your parrot bit me” as opposed to (passive) “I was bitten by your parrot.” (The choice, in this case, may depend on characterisation. A timid soul fearful of giving offense might well choose the passive construction.) In a story presented by the conventional omniscient narrator – an objective, and largely impersonal formal narrative voice like, say, Tolstoy’s, the passive voice is almost certain to offend and distract. Needless to say, the writer must judge every case individually, and the really good writer may get away with just about anything. But it must be clear that when the writer makes use of the passive he/she knows he/she is doing it and has good reason for what he/she does.
For the sake of digging deeper, I’ll give you a few examples. Remember that the subject is characteristic of the active voice. Active voice gives more information.
ACTIVE: The police officer allowed us to enter the building.
PASSIVE: We were not allowed to enter the building.
My tip is to think PASSIVE IS LIKE DECLARING AN OR THE IMPORTANT MESSAGE.
ACTIVE: The teacher does not allow us to talk during exams.
PASSIVE: We are not allowed to talk during exams.
ACTIVE: Someone stole my car yesterday.
PASSIVE: My car was stolen yesterday
ACTIVE: The photographer took lots of photos at the wedding.
PASSIVE: Lots of photos were taken at the wedding.
I really hope this helps with your editing process. Keep passive voice always in mind, try to learn about it. I guarantee your writing will improve!
My best from a soupy Florence. My goodness it’s humid here!
Here’s the Joanna Penn interview with editor Kirsten Tate in full.
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If you’d like to share any comments or thoughts, I’d be happy to hear from you. Email me directly at lisacliffordwriter@gmail.com.