To Do, Or Be Done To?

That is the question. Today I’ll cover one of my pet peeves—passive sentence construction, as contrasted with the active version.

Defining these types is easy. In active sentence construction (also called ‘active voice’) the subject of the sentence performs the action described by the verb. In passive construction, the subject is the recipient of the action.

For example, here are two sentences from a recent story of mine:

Doctor Rudolph Wellburn looked up from his workbench as Red dragged the tr...