Verbs, we’ve said,
are regarded as the most important part of English sentences because they
contain so much information. That information is reflected in the many forms
verbs can take. Here, we examine more of those forms and the changes they cause
in other parts of the sentence.
VERBS HAVE
VOICE: ACTIVE AND PASSIVE
In Chapter 8 on complements, we discussed two classes of action verbs called transitive and intransitive:
INTRANSITIVE:
TRANSITIVE:
INTRANSITIVE: She wrote.
TRANSITIVE:
We said that verbs are
transitive when they have direct objects, as in the examples above. Linking
verbs are never transitive.
Now we learn another thing: Transitive verbs—and
only
transitives—are capable of two voices:
active and passive.
With active voice verbs, the subject is the
performer of the action and the direct object is the receiver of the action.
The batter hit the ball.
In passive voice verbs, the subject is the
receiver of the action. The performer is deleted from the sentence, or it is
shifted to the end of the sentence in a prepositional phrase:
The ball was hit.
The ball was hit by the batter.
In passive verbs,
the main verb is always a past
participle and the auxiliary just before the main verb is a form of be:
You were made chairman by the club.
She has been elected chairwoman.
She is known to everyone in the club.
REVISING
PASSIVES INTO ACTIVES
It’s often helpful
to rewrite passive sentences as active sen-tences. It’s easy to rewrite this
passive sentence:
You were made chairman by the club.
Simply shift the club to the subject position and you to the direct object position. In
this case, chairman becomes an object
complement.
The club made you chairman.
But what do we do
when the sentence contains no performer of the action?
She has been elected chairwoman.
In cases like
this, we must either locate a performer in the larger context, or leave the
passive unchanged. Here are some more passive sentences, and their active voice
counterparts:
PASSIVE: The news was heard by me on the
radio.
ACTIVE: I heard the news on the radio.
PASSIVE: The essay was graded by the teacher.
ACTIVE: The teacher graded the essay.
PASSIVE: The room was refurnished by our
landlord.
ACTIVE: Our landlord refurnished the room.
THE PASSIVE
COMPLEMENTS
Previously, we’ve
discussed complements in active
sentenc-es. In particular, we’ve discussed transitive verbs and direct objects,
indirect objects, and object complements.
Some passive verbs
take complements, too, called passive
complements. Let’s begin with this
active voice sentence:
Dad gave Mom
her present.
Here Mom is the indirect
object; her present is the direct
object.
We can rewrite Sentence 1 in the passive voice
like this:
2. Mom
was given her present by Dad.
In Sentence 2, Mom is now the subject. We’ve made the
subject in Sentence 1, Dad, the
object of a preposition. And her present
remains the direct object in Sentence 2. This can only be done with active
sentences that contain an indirect object as well as a direct object.
Here are more
pairs of sentences—the first active and the second passive—with direct
objects underlined and indirect objects in bold:
ACTIVE: Ed brought Ralph some hot soup.
PASSIVE: Ralph was brought some hot soup
by Ed.
ACTIVE: Dad showed Jimmy the door.
PASSIVE: Jimmy was shown the door by
Dad.
ACTIVE: Mr. Redden read the class a poem.
PASSIVE: The class was read a poem by
Mr. Redden.
When the direct
object in an active sentence remains the direct object in the passive version
of the same sentence, the object in the passive sentence is sometimes called a retained object. But we’ll simply call
it the direct object.
Some sentences
with object complements can also be made passive:
The club elected Ralph sixth vice-president.
Here Ralph is the direct object and sixth vice-president is the object
complement. When we make the sentence passive, Ralph becomes the subject:
2. Ralph was elected sixth vice-president
by the club.
In Sentence 2, the
object complement of Sentence 1, sixth
vice-president, is now a predicate nominative.
In the following
examples, we will see object complements (underlined in the active sentences)
become predicate nominatives or predicate adjectives in the passive sentences.
The direct objects are in bold:
ACTIVE: We made Mom angry.
PASSIVE: Mom was made angry by us.
(Predicate adjective)
ACTIVE: The chairman appointed
Bob secretary. PASSIVE: Bob
was appointed secretary by the chairman. (Predicate nominative)
ACTIVE: The class declared Ruthie the winner. PASSIVE:
Ruthie was declared the winner by the class. (Predicate nominative)
As you may have
noticed, all of the passive sentences you read are awkward and wordy. Active
versions are often shorter and more direct than passives. Some of the passives
might also be improved by simply deleting the prepositional phrases, as in Bob was
appointed secretary.
INFINITIVE
VERBS
All verbs (except
some of the auxiliary verbs) have an important form that we have not yet
discussed: the infinitive form. In
English, an infinitive verb is simply the first-person present tense of the
verb (like buy, sell, cook, bake, talk,
walk) preceded by the word to. In
this context, to is called a particle
and is simply part of the infinitive. All of these are infinitive verbs:
to buy |
to sell |
to hyperventilate |
to bake |
to talk |
to negotiate |
to inflate |
to cook |
|
All of these sentences contain infinitive
verbs:
My son is learning to speak French.
She wants to take a course to learn
to speak well in public.
We need to meet to discuss the
contracts.
As you can see,
infinitive verbs are important structures that we use every day. We’ll discuss
their uses in another chapter soon.
For now, notice
the difference between infinitive verbs and prepositional phrases beginning
with to. In prepositional phrases, to is typically followed by a noun or
pronoun, not a verb. These are prepositional
phrases:
We’re going to Oregon this summer.
I’ll mail postcards to my friends.
And these are
infinitives, with verbs—not nouns or pronouns— after to:
We’re going to travel this summer.
I’m ready to mail our cards.
PHRASAL VERBS
Phrasal verbs are two-word verbs used as one
word. The second word, called a particle, always looks like a
preposition but without an object:
I’ll look up the word.
I’ll write out a check.
We’ll wait out the storm.
She looked in on the kids
We signed up for a class.
They took off an hour ago.
He sat in on the meeting.
We have put up with this long enough.
Although the
particle looks like a preposition, it cannot be the beginning of a
prepositional phrase. Notice the differences:
I’ll look up the word. (A phrasal verb)
I’ll look up the chimney. (A
prepositional phrase.)
Despite disappointment, they went on.
(A phrasal verb)
They went on the train. (A
prepositional phrase.)
In some phrasal verbs, other words (especially
direct objects)
can appear between the main verb and the particle:
I’ll look the word up.
I’ll write the check out.
He built his confidence up.
I’ll check the information out.
There is another
verbal pattern that may resemble a phrasal verb. Consider these sentences:
I’ve put up with you long enough.
I’ll put the book up on the
shelf.
In the first, put up is a phrasal verb. In the second,
put is the verb and up is neither a particle nor a
preposition, but simply an adverb. (Compare I’ll
put the book down or I’ll put the
book aside.)
Don’t confuse the
term phrasal verbs with the similar
term verb phrase.
POINTS FOR
WRITERS
1. When to use
active and passive verbs.
Active voice
sentences are often more effective than passive voice sentences. The active
voice is usually more concise and direct. Compare these two sentences:
Chris is reading The Lord of the Rings for the second time.
The Lord of the Rings is being read by Chris for the second time.
In the first
sentence, the subject is actively performing the action. The sentence is
clearly about Chris, not the book, so
it’s a reasonable choice to make Chris
the subject.
But there are
times when we do want to focus on the recipient of the action, as in this
passive sentence, which we might see in our newspapers or hear in a broadcast:
A convenience store on Fifth Street was
robbed last night.
If the writer does
not yet know who performed this action, the passive may well be the better
choice here. (Of course, we might also write Someone robbed a convenience store. . . .)
Consider this example:
John F. Kennedy was elected President
in 1960.
We all know that American voters, or a
substantial number of them, elected Kennedy, and the writer may be intending to
focus on Kennedy, not the electorate. The passive voice makes sense here.
Although the
passive certainly has its uses, prefer the active voice unless you have a good
reason for the passive.
EXERCISES
1. Rewrite
the following passive voice sentences as active voice sentences, as in this example:
PASSIVE: I was given a prescription by my
doctor.
ACTIVE: My doctor gave me a prescription.
1. Your letter was received by me.
I was made happy by your letter.
I was given instructions today by my supervisor.
My last essay was given a C by my English teacher.
I was seen at the mall by Cheryl.
The mail was delivered by the postman at noon.
After the symphony was played beautifully by
the orchestra, the composer was praised by the critics.
2.
In the passive sentences above, locate, underline, and identify the passive complements: the direct object (DO), the
predicate adjective (PA), and the predicate nominate (PN), as in this example:
DO
PASSIVE: I was
given a prescription by my doctor last night.
3. Distinguish
phrasal verbs from verbs followed by prepositional phrases, as in these examples:
I’ll turn on the television.
[Phrasal verb]
That new car can
turn on a dime. [Verb with prepositional phrase]
We’ll turn off the highway at
the next exit. Please turn off the radio.
2. The news comes on at 10 pm.
The gifts came on Christmas Eve.
The pumpkin turned into a beautiful coach. We’ll
turn into this driveway.
We will now take up the collection.
They took the dresser up the stairs.
He called out to her before she drove away. He
called out the window.