Writing Passionates discussion

lol. I am very aware of passive vs. active voice. I used to write in the passive a lot, only as my mom started reading my writing she would point it out to me all the time. Now I hate the passive voice, and avoid it at all costs ... although sometimes, when I'm spacing out, I use it by accident. But at least I notice it when I'm editing. haha

I've never heard of active or passive voice before. I've never actually had a good lit teacher before who taught me anything. Except this year. And we haven't worked on active/passive voice. So I don't really know the difference between the two. Would anyone care to give me a brief explanation, or perhaps a source that explains it well?

I'm not sure how to explain it, really ... Well, for example, the active would be, "I ate my lunch" vs the passive, which would be, "My lunch had been eaten by me".

I learned about this about a month ago in school. Don't worry I'm not completley daft, just a little bit though. Haha, "mean old man", not really, if I asked you how old you probably wouldn't tell, so I won't.

Ah. I thought that it might be something like that. Well, sentences like those are just wordy and awkward. And I'm fairly certain that I don't use those types of sentences, particularly since has taught us (and quite effectively, I might add) to banish all unnecessary being verbs because they make writing boring. It seems as though passive voice cannot be written WITHOUT being verbs.

I think that the only case where I would use the phrase "The lost sheep was found by the shepherd" would be if the character was the sheep, and the shepherd wasn't important. Of course, if I were writing from the POV of a sheep, then I probably wouldn't phrase it like that anyhow. I mean, why not describe how the sheep feels?

Oh my gosh, you aren't that old. You had me thinking you were 80 or something. In fact you are younger than both of my grandparents. Congrats on the new grandson. Peace, Marley!

You aren't old. Old to me is like ... 85. My great-grandparents age. Not 60. That's younger then some of my grandparents. :)

i knoooowww. the passive bothers me sooo much! >.<

I don't think I ever write like that . . . It sounds weird

well, you don't always notice it. it's not always so obvious; that's what's so aggravating about it. >.<

OMG THAT ANNOYS ME SO MUCH! EVERY TIME I SPELL CHECK IT HIGHLIGHTS THIS ONE SENTENCE AND I'M LIKE GAAAAAHHHHH!!!!

XD exactly.

him idk . . .

Dear David- Im delighted to peruse your group. Im a novice and I confess "much older" than the flavor of most of your followers. Just took a class from Molly Gloss. What an interesting perspective on the mechanics of writing scene. If you ever get north to Baker City check out Betty's Books and give a little lecture. Ill be interested to follow your writing topics and tips.As for the youngins, Im inspired about your passion for life if a little baffled by the first person only leanings.

Hmm, I remember learning about this last year. I'm pretty sure I do this in my writing. :( But what's so annoying is that I get the concept (sort of), but I'm still a bit confused when actually writing (applying it). Would anyone mind sharing smoe more passive vs. active sentences? Perhaps a few passive sentences that might be confused with passive (not as obvious).

Well, a hint for you is to remove as many being verbs from your writing as possible (the main seven are: am, is, are, was, were, be, being, been).

Passive voice requires the use of 'is' or 'was' depending on the tense of your writing. Or at least, I think it does... I never learned about this in school or anything, but I can't think of any passive sentece that does not use one of those words.

And even if your sentence uses one of the words and isn't passive, you can still replace the being verb with something more interesting. That way, instead of writing, "He is short" you will have, "He towers over the other students." The later gives a much better image, doesn't it?

Okay, thanks! :)