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Passive basically means that your narrative is letting things happen to objects, rather than letting the objects take action.

The simple way of putting it is such:

This is passive: The mouse was eaten by the cat.

This is active: The cat ate the mouse.

In the passive construct, the subject of the sentence is having something done to it. The mouse is being eaten. In other words, being passive while something else is being active.

In the active construct that subject of the sentence is taking action.

Impossible to say, without looking at an example. Post a representative portion here in the Share Your Work forum, and you'll likely get some useful comments.

caw

(Sigh.)

Google 'passive voice'.

Could it be said that the use of 'was' in a sentance can be a red flag for passive writing? I have found that my writing can be very emotive but still passive.

Billycourty said:

Could it be said that the use of 'was' in a sentance can be a red flag for passive writing?

Click to expand...

No, the use of 'was' in not an automatic indicator of passive voice. 'Was' is the simple past tense of the verb 'is'.

PLEASE. Google 'passive voice'. Or even go to the Grammar and Syntax sub-forum and search on 'passive voice'. There is already a wealth of info on the Web and in AW on this subject. As a matter of fact, there's even a *current* thread on passive voice in the Grammar subforum.

Passive voice isn't even always bad. Like others said, search around and you'll get an indication of what it is. It's mainly a problem when it stagnates sentences that function better in active voice.

No one is trying to blow you off as far as answering your question, it is just that sometimes there are many many threads about the same thing, and people get tired of explaining it again and again.

first though, you get reviews after you are published, before that you get beta reads or critiques.

Also understand that a lot of the time, unless the crit is done by someone with a lot of writing experience, they may flag things as passive that are not. Happens a lot, oh this is passive because it contains this word. It may be passive because it contains certain words, but that is not always the case.

Do a search right here on AW for passive voice--the search tool is in the blue bar under where you sign in, there you will find more threads on it than you can read in a week.

Under the tech forms Rodger Carlson has a thread--it's a sticky with some macros you can use in MS Word to look for words that may indicate passive voice. They are a great help in that they make you look at word choices and see if you can make the sentence stronger.

Most times what people are flagging is not passive voice, but weak writing.

Shawn, a little ashamed of AW'ers who have forgotten we are here to help as well as learn.