The voice of a sentence, active or passive, tells the reader or listener whether the subject is acting in the sentence or being acted upon. Only transitive verbs have voice.

In the active voice, the subject is performing the action of the sentence.
In the passive voice, the subject is being acted upon.

Occasionally, a writing situation demands the passive voice, but normally avoid over-reliance on to be verbs (is, am, are, was, be, being, been, were, will be, will have been, etc.) whenever possible in favor of vivid verbs.

Example:

     active - John ate the apples.
     passive - The apples were eaten by John.

John, the subject of the first sentence, is the one performing the action of the verb, so the sentence is an active sentence.
The apples, the subject of the second sentence, are receiving the action of the verb, so the sentence is a passive one.

Example:
     active - Martha asked the professor a question.
     passive - The professor was asked a question by Martha.

Again, Martha is the one doing the asking in both cases, but she is the subject only in the first sentence.

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04/09/99