Passive voice: introduction

When you use it

You use the passive when the action or its object matters more than the person who does it: This bridge was built in 1905. Who built it is unknown, obvious or simply less interesting than the bridge. The passive is also the natural choice when you do not want to name the doer, and in formal writing such as notices, news and instructions: Breakfast is served from seven. If the doer is important, you add by: The book was written by Anna.

How it is formed

The object of the active sentence becomes the subject of the passive one. The verb becomes a form of be plus the past participle. The tense is carried by be.

Be agrees with the new subject in number.

The past participle is the -ed form of regular verbs and the third form of irregular verbs: clean → cleaned, build → built, speak → spoken, steal → stolen. The participle never changes for person or number.

Examples

• English is spoken in many countries.
• The office is cleaned every evening.
• This bridge was built in 1905.
• My phone was stolen on the train.
• The letters are sent by post, not by email.
• Tom was invited to the wedding, but Anna wasn't.
• Is breakfast included in the price?
• The windows were not closed, and it rained all night.

In the sentence about the phone, the thief is unknown, so the passive is the only comfortable way to report the event. In the sentence about the wedding, the passive keeps Tom and Anna in the subject position, where the contrast between them is easiest to see.

Common mistakes

• ✗ This bridge built in 1905.
  ✓ This bridge was built in 1905.
  Ukrainian and Russian can form a passive without any auxiliary in the present: міст побудований / мост построен. English always needs a form of be. Without it, built reads as an active past simple, and the sentence says that the bridge built something.
• ✗ The house was build last year.
  ✓ The house was built last year.
  After be the verb must be the past participle, never the base form or the past simple. With regular verbs the mistake is invisible, because -ed serves both purposes; with irregular verbs such as build, write and take it shows.
• ✗ Here speak English. / Here people speak English.
  ✓ English is spoken here.
  In Ukrainian and Russian an unnamed doer is expressed by a third-person plural verb with no subject: тут розмовляють англійською / здесь говорят по-английски. English has no subjectless sentences, so it uses the passive instead. Whenever you would say говорят, продають or кажуть without saying who, reach for the passive.
• ✗ Me was given a present. / To me was given a present.
  ✓ I was given a present.
  In Slavic languages the receiver stays in the dative case: мені подарували / мне подарили. In English the receiver becomes the ordinary subject of the passive sentence and takes the subject form I, she, they.
• ✗ This song was written from Tom.
  ✓ This song was written by Tom.
  The doer in a passive sentence is introduced by by. Ukrainian and Russian use the instrumental case for the same job, написана Томом, and learners sometimes translate it with from or with. With is reserved for the tool: cut with a knife, but cut by the cook.

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