Passive Voice

An earlier version of this advice appeared in my LiveJournal in 2005.

Okay, listen up--this one's important. And I'm only going to say it this one time.

Passive Voice

To judge by what I see on boards and in newsgroups and online writing workshops, many writers mistakenly believe that any verb construction involving "to be" is passive voice.

Passive voice is when the subject of the sentence is acted upon by the object.

The cup (subject) was picked up by the man (object).

The dog (subject) was run over by the car (object).

The ball (subject) is hit repeatedly by the bat (object).

Nothing else is passive voice. NOTHING. Got it?

The boy was running after the dog is past continuous (aka past progressive). It is NOT passive voice. It is NOT passive. It describes continuing rather than completed action.

Got that? Good.