Is Passive Voice Always Wrong? When and How to Use Passive vs Active Voice in Writing

From Edie: Is passive voice always wrong? Lori Hatcher shares when and how to use passive vs active voice to strengthen your writing with clear, practical examples and simple guidelines.

Is Passive Voice Always Wrong? When and How to Use Passive vs Active Voice in Writing

by Lori Hatcher

One of the first lessons I learned in professional writing was to purge passive voice from my writing. “Passive voice weakens your writing,” they said. “Instead of using To Be verbs, use strong action words instead.”

At first I was so clueless I couldn’t recognize passive voice, but after a few red-lined critiques where the editor took time not only to point out my wimpy passive voice but to suggest how I might strengthen it, the light dawned on my literary ignorance. Consider this example that may or may not have come directly from one of my articles:

Passive: The kitchen was clean, swept, and mopped.

Active: My children cleaned, swept, and mopped my kitchen. (This excerpt clearly came from a work of fiction.)

In the passive example, the subject (my kitchen) wasn’t doing the action. The action (cleaning, sweeping, mopping) was being done to it. In a passive sentence construction, the reader typically doesn’t know who or what is doing the action, just that it’s been done.

In the active example, we see that my darling children had cleaned, swept, and mopped my kitchen. The subject (my children) had done the action (cleaned, swept, and mopped).

Is Active Voice Always Best?

No.

Sometimes, we don’t know who has done the action. Suppose I was describing what I saw when my protagonist entered the Air B&B? I might write, “Even though she’d only been gone an hour, Sally could smell the scent of pine and lemon. The kitchen was clean, swept, and mopped.” This is a classic and appropriate use of passive voice. The reader doesn’t need to know Sally the maid had cleaned, swept, and mopped the kitchen unless this detail is relative to the story. 

Journalists and politicians often use passive voice to avoid assigning blame. Consider the famous, “Mistakes were made” comment. This is a classic cover up. Not voting for her.

In contrast, “Mistakes were made, and I’m going to find out who made them” gets my vote every time. 

3 Questions to Ask When Deciding to Use Passive Voice

Before you choose your passive/active sentence construction, ask yourself some questions:

1. Do I know who or what did the action? If not, passive voice is appropriate.

Example: A puppy was abandoned on the side of Highway #1.

If I do, the active voice usually works better.

Example: A man wearing a red hoodie abandoned a puppy on the side of Highway #1.

2. Do I want to protect the one who did the action?

Example: A baby was left outside Franklin Memorial Hospital late Tuesday night under Daniel’s Law.

Or do I want to expose the one who did the action?

Example: A dark-haired woman wearing a red hoodie abandoned a baby at Bruegger’s Bagel shop in Compton, Massachusetts. 

3. Do I want to emphasize the action or the person doing the action? If I want to spotlight the action, I might choose to use passive voice.

Example: A Pitt bull was attacked by two brown and tan chihuahuas early Monday morning near the corner of State and Martin streets.

If I want to emphasize the person or thing doing the action (for credit or blame), I’ll use active voice.

Example: Two brown and tan chihuahuas attacked a Pitt bull early Monday morning near the corner of State and Martin streets. 

Robust and engaging writing leans heavily on strong verbs and the active voice, but this doesn’t mean we can never use passive voice. If used correctly and intentionally, passive voice acts as a valuable tool in your writing toolkit.

I think we can all agree that we have much more sympathy when we sing about how Grandma got run over by a reindeer instead of hearing how a reindeer ran over Grandma. 

Ninety-five times out of a hundred, active voice wins, but every now and then, a well-used passive sentence takes the prize.

Has a passive sentence ever been used by you intentionally and for emphasis?

Have you ever used a passive sentence intentionally and for emphasis? 

Share an example in the comment box below and tell us why you chose to write it this way.

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Is Passive Voice Always Wrong? When and How to Use Passive vs Active Voice in Writing from Lori Hatcher on @EdieMelson (Click to Tweet)

Since she was old enough to read a Little Golden Book, Lori Hatcher has been fascinated by words. She’s woven them into seven devotionals with Our Daily Bread Publishing, including her latest, Lord, I Believe: 60 Devotions for Your Troubled Heart. She shares her insight in writers workshops around the country and has encouraged women’s ministry groups in the United States, Japan, Mexico, and Spain. Connect with her at LoriHatcher.com.