Talking about passive here, do you know how many “passive” aggressive people it takes to change a light bulb? Oh! Never mind… I rather keep you in the dark. I heard that somewhere, I can’t remember where…
Oh! No! Don’t tell me you’re mad at me for joking around with you. Okay, I will back down, don’t want to make you use your writer’s voice.
Let’s change the subject and head straight over to why write in active voice rather than passive.
There was a time when I was sending my book proposals to publishers, and then I was asked for the manuscript. Not many publishers will give you feedback, but one did say to me to try and apply the active voice more in my writing. This is why I thought it would be great to go through all the reasons why active voice is preferred compared to passive.
A sentence that goes in the order of the subject, the verb and the object is active.
Example
Samantha cut her hand.
Joy combed the dog.
The subject is performing the act.
With passive voice, the writer uses “to be” in their sentence.
Example
The dog was combed by Joy.
The watermelons are eaten by the hippopotamus.
The object is performed by the subject.
Why write in active voice rather than passive?
Active voice is just as important in business as it is in writing a novel, blog post, screenplay, short story, email or any piece of content, however, it does come down to the writer, author or poet because it depends on what they are trying to demonstrate in their piece of content. Active voice brings the point in clearly and responsibly and in business it takes head-on the responsibility i.e., owning it. Using passive voice in business language makes the apology, the solution, and the ownership look weak.
Active voice is clear, and straight while the passive voice is subtle and vague. Passive voice is often used in museums, or places where entry has rules, e.g., Cameras are not allowed.
When I think of a screenplay I think of the action the actor is doing, similarly, when one writes a novel or children’s book it makes sense for the reader to feel or be impacted directly by all the actors in the novel, book, piece of content or acting out a story this is why write in active voice rather than passive if one wants their work to be of high quality not to say that the passive voice doesn’t play its sophisticated role when used intentionally. Need I not say, that so many writers write unconsciously in the passive voice, in fact, I was one of them and still can end up being one of them if I do not place intentional writing on myself during my writing sessions.
Why write in active voice rather than passive is a detail that not many writers, authors or poets look into when it comes to the audience that will be reading the book or piece of content. Imagine if an intelligent person, leader or subject leader in the industry of the writer, author or poet picks up the piece of content? This is what defines okay from excellent. The active voice is short, clear and precise not like wordy, passive sentences, however, the passive voice when used artfully can create mystery if the writer, author or poet so wishes or does not imply who the subject actually is (have you noticed news reporting?)
Why write in active voice rather than passive is when you want to emphasize the subject whereas in the passive voice there is the emphasis on the object.
As a writer, I want to cover something that many writers don’t write/talk about. Have you heard the sentence, “everything is energy?” If not, then let’s get into it, if you have heard that sentence before then here’s something more with regards to “everything is energy.” Do you want to transmit dull energy, or do you want the reader to catch the energetic vibration intended to continue reading the book, blog post, email, or piece of content? What makes the reader leave in their rocket in a second and what makes the reader switch the engine off to their rocket to stick around? The energy in the sentences they are reading. This is why publishers; editors of publishing houses look out for active voice in the manuscripts. Wordy sentences only make the content drag.
Why write in active voice rather than passive? Let me take this a little bit further now. When you enter a new profession, have new colleges, a new work environment, and challenges that were different from what you were doing before, how does it feel on that first day? How does it feel for the first week? Similarly, the active voice creates confidence to whom the message is being transmitted to however, for the reader to have picked up the content, the writing was made intentional. The same confidence cannot be displayed to a greater potential until someone is fully confident in the role they play in their profession or life. Hopefully, this can help one see the reality of why write in active voice rather than passive, and how it stands out in our real world.
I had to learn the hard way through my proposals and requests for my manuscripts to eventually have to figure out for myself why to write in active voice rather than passive, but today, I saved you a lot of time and effort to clean up manuscripts and content before publishing or sending it over to publishers.
So, stick around on my website and don’t move to Switzerland, even though their flag has a big plus.
You can also have a look at the Why write in active voice rather than passive short video.
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In the next article, I will be going into writing a winning book proposal.
Yours sincerely
T. Dench Patel
