PASSIVE VOICE AND ACTIVE VOICE
There are two grammatical voices in English, the ACTIVE VOICE and the PASSIVE VOICE. In the active voice, the subject of the sentence, which usually appears at the beginning of the sentence, is performing the action of the verb. However, in the passive voice, the object of the verb appears at the beginning of the sentence. The verb is in the passive form, and the subject may not appear in the sentence. The passive form of a verb consists of a form of the verb to be plus the past participle of the main verb.
For example:
| ACTIVE |
Lucy ate the pudding.
The subject, Lucy, is the one doing the action.
| PASSIVE |
The pudding was eaten (past participle) by Lucy.
The subject, pudding, does not act; instead, something happens to it.
In general, active verbs are more effective than passive ones. Because they make your writing more clear. The passive voice of the verb is appropriate when the performer of the action is unknown or is less important than the receiver of the action.
For example:
1. My house was robbed last night. (The performer of the action is unknown.)
2. Mark was seriously injured as a result of your carelessness. (The receiver of the action, Mark, is being emphasized.)
In the first sentence, above, "was" is the past tense of the verb "to be," and "robbed" is the past participle of the verb "to rob."
In the second sentence, above, "was" is the past tense of the verb "to be," and "injured" is the past participle of the verb "to injure."
IMPORTANT NOTE
The "by-phrase" is used after verbs in the passive voice when it is important to know who performs an action.
For example:
This sweater was made by my aunt.
The touchdown was scored by George.
In the active voice, these two sentences would appear as follows:
My aunt made this sweater. George scored the touchdown.