I’ll add a “rule” for Mr Orwell: Be precise and make your meaning clear. Don’t use words like “never” or “always” if you don’t mean them
Yes. Though I still think the language is overly broad. Cut a word whenever it is possible? There may be plenty of times, in fiction, where it is possible to cut a word and you don’t want to do it. It may depend on style, the narrative point of view, and even the personality of the narrator if you have one that is overt and engaged with the reader. You could ruin a lot of good fiction by paring every sentence down to the least necessary number of economical words.
Yeah, I certainly agree with that. I was going to make a joke about wanting to cut all the sentences in my last review or story down to absolute zero. I think that is it though, and you are absolutely right, it's context that's key. I mean, if he was so against the passive voice and cutting words out, why would he start the very essay those rules came from with this: "Most people who bother with the matter at all would admit that the English language is in a bad way, but it is generally assumed that we cannot by conscious action do anything about it." Cutting down all the 'unnecessary' words and switching to purely active voice it would be something like: 'Most people who care about the English Language would admit it is in a bad way, but they generally assume nothing can be done about it.' But the first one feels more aloof and objective, more academic. It's the kind of tone you want when you are trying to be objective. The second feels a lot more scrappy and hurried, and more partisan. The first sentence is talking calmly before a wall of books while the second is at the barricades with a rifle, shooting at government soldiers. In general, I suppose keeping rules like this in mind can't exactly hurt, but yes - I think they are too broad too.
That's a great point about the objective/academic tone. It's good to be aware that active voice can sometimes be too blunt and confrontational. All 'voices' have their uses, don't they. You're a lot less likely to argue with this statement: Than this one:
Pardon me for horning in, but aren't these examples both in the passive voice? I agree though; I think any wholesale rejection of the passive voice is misguided. It's kind of an integral part of English grammar.
Regarding the part of your comment that I took the liberty of bolding: I found this both incredibly accurate, and for some reason incredibly funny. Anyway, this is why I think Orwell's most important rule here is actually his last one.
Looking at it again you are right. I suppose for a more active sentence you could have 'someone had hung the body during the night'.
Regarding the passive voice, the device can be an important tool. "Mistakes were made" is different from"we made mistakes" in that the speaker is dodging the issue as to where the blame lies. I see that a lot in government proclamations. And Robert Claiborne, in his brilliant book Our Marvelous Native Tongue, gives an excellent example of government obfuscation:
I'm amused that the first sentence after the rule against using the passive is in the passive even though it could be in the active.
I'm a huge Orwell fan, but I'm reading some essays by another idol of mine Asimov and he's absolutely scathing of Orwell! Says that dystopian fiction as bleak as 1984 offers no light at all and as such is no good! Sorry Aso old pal, I have to disagree. 1984 might be one of the bleakest pieces of literature ever created but it also happens to be one of the best as well. Its utter despair is part of its appeal, in life there is not always redemption, sometimes things do not end well at all. "....- Imagine a boot stamping on a human face forever." I mean, Asimov had some great ideas and is of course one of the all time top dogs of Sci Fi but let's be honest, he never wrote a single line as powerful as that. So I wonder how much attention Asimov paid to Orwell's 5 rules....!
Interesting post, I had no idea Asimov said this. I must admit I'm not really very familiar with Asimov - but I suppose it's because of different ways of thinking. I doubt Orwell would have personally called his book science fiction, or cared to, he was strictly a political writer. The science fiction in Nineteen Eighty-Four isn't the focus, while as I understand it for Asimov it was. I'd have to look into this.
You can find it in the anthology 'Gold'. The latter half is all short essays and in the essay 'nowhere' which is about Utopia/Dystopia he says "And yet pure dystopian tales are as dull and unbearable as pure utopian ones. Consider the most famous pure dystopian tale of modern times, 1984....I consider it an abominably poor book. It made a big hit (in my opinion) only because it rode the tidal wave of cold war sentiment in the US" Disagree Isaac sorry pal. agree, Orwell was not a Sci-Fi writer at all, his other work is a testament to that. But then for someone who isn't Sci-Fi he still managed to set the bar for what is now known as 'Speculative Fiction'!
Asimov and Orwell aren't really comparable imo. Asimov's main goal was to entertain with enjoyable, well-written space stories and novels. Great author. I've enjoyed his books. Orwell's main purpose, as far as I'm aware, was not to entertain; it was political, to warn against totalitarianism and authoritarian forms of government. Great author as well, but I can't say that I've really enjoyed his books, as much as I value them. Orwell was a journalist, and I think the purpose of journalism carries over to his fiction.
Eric Blair managed to keep his real identity secret . As an old Etonian, he had many rich and influential friends. David Astor, a close friend, owned the Observer newspaper, Erick was a journalist for the paper for over seven years. He also worked for the BBC as a political writer and was editor of the left-wing magazine The Tribune. Writing as George Orwell was almost just a hobby. If you're interested in George ,there is the Complet George Orwell, in two volumes. It is possible to read through it and see a writer in development.
I still struggle with the 'passive/active' thing. The man was bitten by the dog. (passive)The dog bit the man. (active).The active is better because it’s shorter and more forceful. I still don't fully understand why the second is more forceful. Yes it's shorter, but why is it better? Why doesn't it depend on what sentence comes before or after? Sue looked out the window and saw blood on the ground. She could see something had happened to a man with blood on his pants. Someone was holding back a large rottweiler. It appeared the man was bitten by the dog. Sue looked out the window and saw blood on the ground. She could see something had happened to a man with blood on his pants. Someone was holding back a large rottweiler. It appeared the dog bit the man. Why is the second better than the first?
I submit the following is even better: Sue saw blood on the ground outside the window. A man with blood on his pants leaned against the garden fence. A women on the sidewalk struggled to restrain a large rottweiler. Apparently the dog bit the man. A few additional concrete details, took out "she could see" in the second sentence because it's unnecessary. To get back to the passive/active part of the discussion, I think the word "active" gives you an idea. Active writing tends to be more immediate and does a better job of drawing the reader into the action. Not that it always has to be used--I'm a fan of passive writing for certain stories where it works well.
Think about subject and verb positioning. What is the subject of the sentence, and what is it doing (that would be the verb). The man is the subject of your first example. What does the man do? Nothing. He gets bitten. That isn't doing something, it's having something done to him. It's the dog that's active in that sentence, because it's the one doing something. Now if the man bit the dog, then you'd have an active sentence!
You can use the passive to put emphasis on different elements. On my way home from school, a jaguar bit me. On my way home from school, I was bitten by a jaguar. I like the second one much better because the animal is so weird that it should get the emphasis at the end. (I suppose if your route was thick with jaguars then the first one might work better.) If it were just a dog, I probably would have used the first one. Well, depending on what the paragraph was supposed to do. And it also depends how your sentences are connecting. blah blah blah X. X blah blah blah (sentence cohesion using near elements) X blah blah blah. X blah blah blah. (no near elements, though there's other ways to get cohesion . . .) On my way home from school, I was bitten by a jaguar. It mush have escaped the zoo. (tight cohesion) Or even for clarity. to keep pronouns straight: On my way home from school, my brother was chased by the town vicar. He'd heard about the catechism class vaping ring. Passives have lots of uses. Not that you have to use them. There's so many choices.
The only trouble I see with that phrasing is it doesn't make clear whether it was the vicar or the brother who'd heard about the vaping ring. Maybe the brother had stumbled on to the vicar's vaping ring (which would be a great name for a rock band, wouldn't it?) and the vicar was chasing him to make sure he didn't blab.
I'm trying to remember this from Jannert's signature. It was a quote by JD Ray, and it said something like "A pronoun refers back to the next previous logical noun." But of course even still, there can be some confusion about which is the more logical (and most people don't know these grammatical rules). So yeah, confusion does hover over that construction.
