Ed and the Passive Voice

Let me introduce you to a friend who knows passive voice intimately. His name is Ed. Okay, he isn’t really a person, and undoubtedly isn’t a ‘he’, but Ed is my friend—our friend.

I’ll get back to Ed in a minute. First, I want to show you what passive voice is. The following paragraph is riddled with it:

The missing child case had been solved by Jack Long, the Police Chief. Two-year-old Savannah Smith was discovered after several hours of probing beneath the debris covered waters of Copsey Lake. He had located her. She had been sleeping in the back seat of her mother’s car.

Did you feel alienated or distracted while reading that?

The next paragraph gets the same information across, but in active voice:

After several hours of probing beneath the debris covered waters of Copsey Lake, Police Chief Jack Long solved the missing child case. He discovered two-year-old Savannah Smith sleeping in the back seat of her mother’s car.

Whew! This sounds much better, doesn’t it? Now I’ll refer back to Ed.

Verbs ending in “-ed” (Ed) help identify passive voice. Locate verbs ending in “-ed” (solved, discovered, located.) If these verbs are preceded by a form of the verb “to be” (are, was, am, been has been, have been, had been, will be, will have been, being) you are likely using passive voice. There are some exceptions to the “-ed” idea, but they are easy to detect.

Example:

“The case was solved by Jack.” –passive

“Jack solved the case.” – active

When we write a sentence where the subject is receiving the action, rather than being or doing, we are using passive voice.