Passive sentences exist for a reason, mainly to stitch a paragraph together. Sometimes a passive sentence works best for this. From Blade by David Goyer. If I write that first sentence in the active, I must first come up with a doer, but watch what happens. A vampire slave situates carafes filled with blood along the table. It doesn't read as well. How do you put situates next to along the table by writing in the active without it sounding odd? This is just one example of passive being better in this case. There are times when you want one sentence to flow into the next, but to do so, you want old information at the beginning. However, sometimes to do that, you have to write the sentence in the passive. The book Style by Joseph Williams, has a whole section on this.
But the sentence: "Chilled carafes filled with blood are situated along the table." is not passive. "Situated" in this case is an adjective. In fact, somewhat to my surprise, the primary definition of "situated" that I find is as an adjective. (I initially said "and perhaps only" definition, but then I found discussion of "be situated" as a possible verb.)
Quite right. "Passive sentences exist for a reason" is true, but the example isn't relevant. And the fact that something can "be situated" doesn't make "situated" a verb any more than something being blue makes "blue" a verb. In English, at least. The OED lists it as only an adjective (not that that will stop some people saying things like "he situated it next to the other one").
Still probably not a passive, although at least now it's ambiguous and could be. Read what CH878 wrote about non-finite verbs again.
Passive voice is certainly useful in dialogue, or in narration by certain types of character. My roommate has a terrible problem emotionally with taking responsibility for his own mistakes. He'll say, "Oh, crap!" and I'll say, "What?" He'll say, "The beer got spilled!" He will never say, "I spilled my beer." He'll only say, "The beer got spilled!" as if some unseen force sneaked up behind him and spilled his beer. This is a way in which passive voice can be used to remove responsibility from someone. You can say, "Something happened," without specifying who did it. In active voice, the person doing the "something" has to be mentioned.
^^ "The beer got spilled" that's causative, not passive. @ digtig: I have never heard of 'encrust' having a direct synonym with 'ornament' in the active sense, but I won't argue with you or your dictionary.
Look what I started! Its all great stuff. Although, I must admit that I find this thread becoming a semantical debate on verb tenses instead of people maybe showing examples of why active voice is preferred in a situation and why passive voice would be better which is where I was going with this post. I was revising what I have written of my book so far and was going through and changing all of the tenses and making most of them active unless I absolutely FELT that it was right. (regarding passive) What I was afraid of was that I may be deleting things that were unnecessary.
Passive is only used when 1) it is more important to draw our attention to the person or thing acted upon: The victim was struck down during the early morning hours. 2) the actor in the situation is not important: The volcano can be seen on the left side of the boat. 3) the actor is obvious: The robber was arrested in the café restaurant. TheComet
Well, I think that the debate is relevant, because many of the examples being given as a good use of passive voice, are _not_ passive voice at all. It's a bit like arguing for the value of fruit by using brussels sprouts as an example. And this may be relevant to your book, because it's possible that the passive voice sentences that you're converting to active, are not actually passive voice at all. Maybe you could offer some examples of the types of sentences that you're wondering if you should rewrite?
good call INC soon. I will go through what I have so far and see what I can identify and give some examples. If any of you enjoy fantasy I would be more then happy to let you read what I have so far. Not even for critique just for recreation/aesthetic value. Just private message me if your interested.
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." The vast majority of the examples here are not passive voice; this one is.
Is active. I think Minstrel correctly identified his beer phrase as passive. But, I barely care. Can you identify good writing from bad...tis all that matters.
Voice, active or passive, is another writing tool. A writer needs to know how to recognize each, and the strengths and weaknesses of one over the other. Active voice is better for main story action, but passive has a place as well. It can serve as contrast to make active passages stand out more. Passive voice can be used to de-emphasize passages, or to slow the perceived pace. Passive voice also allows you to conceal the agent of the action (whoever or whatever is executing the action), and also serves where the agent is unknown. That is why the language contains passive voice as well as active voice. Not to confuse writers, but to add to the wealth of choices for a writer.
There is no necessity here. Some may benefit, some not. Do you think Freddie Couples understands the physics, the mechanics of the golf swing? There are passive and active elements because linguists have manufactured the distinction (that few understand, Strunk and White included.). Nothing more.
Strunk was at least correct when he wrote "The need of making a particular word the subject of the sentence will often, as in these examples, determine which voice is to be used." Even if three out of the four examples of passive voice that he gave were not passive voice at all.
I do cover some of that in my blog (here), although I only cover the grammatical reasons -- perhaps I should say something about the stylistic reasons too.
