The Elements of Style

by William Strunk Jr.

This rule does not, of course, mean that the writer should entirely discard the passive voice, which is frequently convenient and sometimes necessary.

A caveat the world chooses to ignore.

At dawn the crowing of a rooster could be heard. »»»»» The cock’s crow came with dawn.

The first of these sentences reads better. Bad example or misplaced principle?

This requires not that the writer make all sentences short, or avoid all detail and treat subjects only in outline, but that every word tell.

The most ignored caveat in style.

the emphasis upon kings arises largely from its meaning and from the context. To receive special emphasis, the subject of a sentence must take the position of the predicate. Through the middle of the valley flowed a winding stream.

This directly contradicts advice on passive voice

Write with nouns and verbs, not with adjectives and adverbs. The adjective hasn’t been built that can pull a weak or inaccurate noun out of a tight place. This is not to disparage adjectives and adverbs; they are indispensable parts of speech.