🥑 passive-aggressive much?

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Passive voice can be wielded as a powerful tool in the right contexts.

Let’s talk about three situations in which passive voice is stronger than active voice.

1) When showing victimhood.

Passive voice: “I was set upon by a highwayman.”

Active voice: “A highwayman set upon me.”

In this example, the passive voice does two things.

It highlights “I” as the person telling the story, indicating that even though a highwayman is part of the narrative, the person you should be focusing on is me.

It also concludes the sentence with the most interesting word in this example: highwayman. This drives momentum forward and keeps the reader reading.

This is especially useful for conveying power dynamics. Someone with power acts; someone without power is acted upon.

2) When writing a sentence without an actor.

“Opportunity is cast before those who least deserve it.”

Who’s doing the casting? No one. There is no actor, no object for this verb. We can’t simply rearrange this sentence into active voice, because there wouldn’t be a subject.

Of course, that begs the question, “Is it a good sentence?”

Which takes us to the next point:

3) When crafting the rhythm of your prose.

“I was drawn into the music of the moment.”

Read that aloud. Did you catch the pattern of stressed syllables?

“I was drawn into the music of the moment.”

Lyrical prose, the kind that sings in your ears and keeps you reading, uses intentional repetition and variation—just like songwriting.

You could activate this sentence, but it would lose that pizzazz.

If your sentences feel clunky on the tongue, readers will struggle. If they flow from one sentence to the next, your readers will follow—whether or not you’re using passive voice.

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