The "Something" of "Someone" Question

It's just possesive use, hun, not passive.

Jack's heart. (the heart belonging to Jack)
The heart of Jack. (still possession here too)

Passive voice is:
long passive: the heart was stolen by Jack
short passive: the heart was stolen.
active voice: Jack stole the heart

If you're using a lot of 'of' genitive possesion, it could get a touch wordy.

Edit, As for 'Jack's eyes stared', I'd question use of body parts here. 'Jack stared' would do.

Jack stared.

Why even use the word eyes? What else could he be staring with?

Jacks' heart began to hammer. (Pound. Beat wildly.)

Let's hope his heart is in his chest. lol

I am a bad one to ask about this as I don't care for 'fluff' stuff.

You have to assume that the reader knows about eyes and hearts. (I'm just giving you a bad time.) But I think you know what I am getting at.

When you read your stuff out loud doesn't this trip you up? It sure would me. Best wishes with this.

CACTUSWENDY said:

When you read your stuff out loud doesn't this trip you up? It sure would me.

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ditto

Sane_Man said:

One of my beta-readers - quite rightly - pointed out that a bad habit of my writing is a tendency to repeatedly use that way of phrasing something. That's passive voice, yes?

"The eyes of Jack stared."

"The heart of Jack started to hammer away in his chest."

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Your beta is correct to point these out, but it's not so much voice as it is learned editing techniques. When I sit down to edit or rewrite my very first step is to highlight articles and remove as many as possible. Your sentences would read back to me as: Eyes of Jack stared. & Heart of Jack started to hammer away in his chest. At which point I hope I would see a problem with the sentence! Try it, it's fun!

A few days ago I noticed a first sentence with no less than seven occurrences of the word: the. It's been rewritten.

One of my other editing steps is to make sure my sentences are as compact as possible... which would reduce yours to: Jack stared. & Jack's heart started to hammer -unless of course his heart wasn't in his chest at the time. Ewe!

Which brings me to this last bit of editing, and sometimes this is the toughest. As a writer, we hope that our audiences have a certain amount of savvy and intelligence. So when you say: his heart hammered (with the exception of any bizarre circumstances) we hope that the reader would assume his heart is still in his chest. Making these assumptions can be difficult. Just the other day I read a sentence that said: She nodded her head. I stared at it for the longest time before I realized that there really isn't any other body part that we nod... so it became simply: She nodded.

Editing is rough work, but bully to your beta for pointing it out and giving you a clue on how to become a better editor.

Good luck!

Sane_Man said:

That's passive voice, yes?

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No.

Active and passive voice are to do with verbs. When the subject of the sentence does something, it's active voice.

When the subject of the sentence has something done to him, it's passive voice.

Bill gave a rose. = active
A rose was given by Bill. = passive

Can you see the difference?

In the first one, the subject does something to something. In this case, giving is done to the rose. Rose
is the object of the verb's action. Bill, the subject of the sentence is the one doing the verb's action.

In the second, the subject receives the action of the verb from the agent. This time, the subject of the sentence is the rose. It receives the action of the verb "to give" by being given. It is the recipient of the action. It receives action passively rather than initiating action actively.

Sane_Man said:

One of my beta-readers - quite rightly - pointed out that a bad habit of my writing is a tendency to repeatedly use that way of phrasing something. That's passive voice, yes?

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I'm not sure what your question is. What do you mean by "that way of phrasing something"? What way?

In the examples you gave, there's nothing passive voice about any of them. The second set simply show the proper use of the possessive form. (Well, the first set is technically proper, too, but rather horribly archaic. ) Although it would be better to say "Jack stared" rather than "Jack's eyes stared." Unless Jack is dead.

Passive voice, simply put, happens when the subject is acted upon rather than doing the acting.

PASSIVE--The apple was eaten. Or, The apple was eaten by John.

ACTIVE--John ate the apple.

Also ACTIVE -- John was hungry.

but PASSIVE -- John was sickened (by the apple).

Jack's eyes can't stare on their own, so Jack stared, not his eyes. Same with any body part, body parts can't act on their own.

It's not passive voice, as others have said.

What it is is unnecessary circumlocution. Honestly, it makes your work sound like a bad translation.

Jack stared. His heart pounded.


Here's Dr. IceCreamEmpress's prescription for you: read your work out loud. It's one of the best ways to break a circumlocution habit. Hearing yourself say things like "The eye of Jack stared" will most likely give you the giggles!

I agree with the others here. Do you read much? Not trying to be offensive, but that wording just jumps out at me like a gushing wound. I'll echo the read out loud point, it should really help with these types of problems .

Don't tell us what Jack's eyes did, but what Jack did. Jack stared. When it comes to Jack's heart hammering, there really is no other way to say it.

Everyone has pretty much already said it. Jack stared. Jack's heart hammered. Simple as that.

Passive is to do with verbs. Make sure your subjects are actually doing an action.

You're welcome. And welcome to the site.

Ditto.

And don't be afraid of using passive voice occassionally.