# Passive voice sentences are fine as long as they're not overused right?



## WolfoxOkamichan (Apr 25, 2009)

I mean, it's fine if I use "The two were at loss of words." right? I mean, I generally use active voice a lot more, but sometimes I have a need to use passive voice.


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## M. LeRenard (Apr 25, 2009)

First of all, "They were at a loss for words" is not a passive sentence.  'They' is the subject, 'were' is an active verb.  Passive voice is where you take what is normally the subject of a sentence and turn it into an object: "I went to the store" becomes "The store was gone to by me."  Or in your case, maybe something like "A loss for words was at by them," or something... although that sounds horribly wrong (how would you make that passive?  Jeez).  But you get the idea.

From my knowledge, the deal with passive voice is that yes, you can use it, and yes it's grammatically correct, but stylistically it's weak, so it's recommended that you avoid it.  Like my example above about the store: it's much more interesting to hear about someone going to a store (this person is doing something) than a store sitting there and receiving someone (the store is not doing anything).  In journalism it's a different case, because passive voice is often used there in order to maintain anonymity ("A twenty-six year old male was hit by a car last Tuesday") or for some other function.  But in fiction, you generally want to avoid it, if only because it's boring to read.


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## TakeWalker (Apr 25, 2009)

On the other hand, when style calls for passive, you use the fuck out of passive. Just remember that use thereof changes how your story is perceived.


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## WolfoxOkamichan (Apr 26, 2009)

Ah, my bad. I didn't notice that.

Yeah I know passive = "The ball was kicked by the player", but I guess the verb be made me think of it. >_<

Out of curiosity, when is passive voice useful?


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## TakeWalker (Apr 26, 2009)

Passive voice is useful for showing helplessness or externality of force. There are actually a lot of cases in which it's useful (drawing attention away from the actor and onto the thing acted upon), but those are the first two that come to mind.


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## Stratelier (Apr 26, 2009)

Passive voice draws attention to *what* is happening at the cost of _who_ (if specifically anyone) is making it happen.  There will be some times when you want it this way, but I can't think of any good examples.


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## M. LeRenard (Apr 26, 2009)

Or, as I said before, when you want to maintain anonymity.  Like, say you're writing a prologue in which some mysterious figure is doing something... mysterious.  Maybe stealing something.  And you don't want the reader to know who it is that's doing this.  So you start off writing in passive voice.  "A jewel was stolen the night before.  It was slid into a handbag and spirited away out of the eyes of security.  It was carried out of the building, past all of the sensors, the IR detection, the door alarms, everything.  An investigation the following day gave no hint to its whereabouts or to the perpetrator's identity."
Something like that.  Granted, you could write that passage in active voice too, and it would be fine, but that would be one example where it's 'acceptable' to use it, I think.
And honestly, anyplace where it's not acceptable to use it turns out pretty obvious.  Frankly, it usually just sounds awful.  "A pie was eaten by me today.  The deliciousness was savored.  The store was later gone to by me so more ingredients could be purchased to make another one."  You know.


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