Active voice is one of the best ways to tighten up your writing. It immediately makes your point clear to the reader without extra words and gives your writing a professional polish. But what exactly is the difference between active and passive voice? I’ll be honest. This took me a long time to figure out, and it’s something I continue to catch and correct in my writing.

The most basic definition of active voice is that the subject in the sentence takes the action instead of the other way around. It’s the difference between “The dog bit the boy” (active) and “The boy was bitten by the dog” (passive). The challenge is that active voice is not always that simple. For example, “The boy was bitten” looks at face value like it could be active, but it’s actually passive because there’s no source for the biting. It could be anything from an agitated hamster to a wolverine.

To illustrate, I’m going to draw on another age-old writing tradition: show don’t tell. And to do that, I’m going to use lines from famous songs. Seeing these lyrics flipped around might screw with your head a little bit if you enjoy these songs as much as I do.

Here’s what it looks like when you take active voice and switch it around to passive voice. The original lyrics are listed first.

Active to Passive

Michael Jackson’s “Billie Jean”

Active voice:
People always told me, be careful of what you do. Don’t go around breaking young girls’ hearts.
Passive voice:
Be careful of what you do, people always told me. Breaking young girl’s hearts is not something you should do.

Green Day’s “When I Come Around”

Active Voice: I heard you crying loud, all the way across town.
Passive Voice: All the way across town, I could hear you crying loud.

Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin’”

Active voice:
Just a small town girl, livin’ in a lonely world.
Passive voice:
Living in a lonely world this small town girl is.

Ray Charles’ “I’ve got a woman”

Active voice:
I’ve got a woman, way over town, who’s good to me.
Passive voice:
There is a woman way over town that I have.

Now let’s switch it around and convert passive voice to active voice. The original lyrics are listed first.

Passive to Active

Queen’s “We Are the Champions”

Passive voice: And bad mistakes, I’ve made a few.
Active voice: I’ve made a few bad mistakes.

Red Hot Chili Peppers’ “Under the Bridge”

Passive Voice: Under the bridge downtown, I could not get enough.
Active Voice: I could not get enough under the downtown bridge.

Radiohead’s “Creep”

Passive Voice: When you were here before, couldn’t look you in the eye.
Active Voice: I couldn’t look you in the eye when you were here before.

House of Pain’s “Jump Around”

Passive Voice: And just like the prodigal son I’ve returned.
Active Voice: I’ve returned just like the prodigal son.

As you can see, there is a time and a place for passive voice. It can catch the eye and pack a punch in ways unimaginable to active voice. But, by and large, active voice will always be your best bet for writing tighter and clearer.

Here are some links if you want to learn more:

http://writingcenter.unc.edu/handouts/passive-voice/

http://www.grammarly.com/blog/2014/a-scary-easy-way-to-help-you-find-passive-voice/

https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/owlprint/539/