Tense Question & the Dreadful Passive Voice

[E McD]

My novel is told in first person POV past tense - like the present tense narrator is beginning a story from the beginning. Would someone with a fresh set of eyes help me, pretty please? If I am telling a story in past tense but reliving the story as I tell it, would I say "all the way up here" or "all the way up there"? Technically, the narrator was there when she was experiencing those feelings, but she is not there now when she is telling it. You know what I mean?

And while I've got you, can someone please explain in the simplest of terms what passive voice is? I know it is a big no-no, but despite everything I have read, I'm not getting it. Because my story is told in past tense, I'm worried sick that I will inadvertantly wander into passive voice without meaning to (never end a sentence in a preposition). HELP! :) Thanks in advance!

[Holly]

My novel is told in first person POV past tense - like the present tense narrator is beginning a story from the beginning. Would someone with a fresh set of eyes help me, pretty please? If I am telling a story in past tense but reliving the story as I tell it, would I say "all the way up here" or "all the way up there"? Technically, the narrator was there when she was experiencing those feelings, but she is not there now when she is telling it. You know what I mean?

And while I've got you, can someone please explain in the simplest of terms what passive voice is? I know it is a big no-no, but despite everything I have read, I'm not getting it. Because my story is told in past tense, I'm worried sick that I will inadvertantly wander into passive voice without meaning to (never end a sentence in a preposition). HELP! :) Thanks in advance!

First question, can you post a sample paragraph?

Second question about passive voice:

Passive:
The cat was chewed.
Doesn't tell you who did the action.

Better as:
The dog chewed the cat.

There's more to passive voice, but that's the essence.

[E McD]

An old toilet squatted near the front door. Obviously there was no need for a toilet in the house with the unlikelihood of indoor plumbing up here, but why go to the trouble of hauling a commode all this was just to let it sit on the porch? It was like a hillbilly status symbol or something, reminding me of the senselessness of those ridiculous gold teeth the Petersburg boys wore to school – their teeth were fine and much prettier without them, but it proved they had money to waste, even though most of them didn’t. Funny how people are willing to go broke trying to prove that they aren’t – even all the way up here.

Ok, so you see how the narrator is referencing an old house she saw and the verb tense is clearly past tense, but then she goes to a thought that that memory sparked NOW, saying, "Funny how people are willing to go broke trying to prove that they aren't - even all the way up here." It is clearly a switch to present tense, but now that we're in present tense, it would be "up there," right? Not "up here," even though she references indoor plumbing "up here"?

UGH - Is this making any sense or is it too confusing and I should just scrap it? :(

[marilyn peake]

E McD –

I love your paragraph! You set up an intriguing world. With tenses, you mostly have to be careful not to use more than one tense in the same sentence or paragraph. Really, a story should be told in only one tense, but writers slip in and out of tenses, especially when writing in first person. I think “there” sounds better in order to keep with the past tense in the following sentence: “Obviously there was no need for a toilet in the house with the unlikelihood of indoor plumbing up [t]here,” ... However, when you write, “Funny how people are willing to go broke trying to prove that they aren’t – even all the way up here.”, I personally think that’s fine because the writer (and most likely the reader) are experiencing that situation immediately, as though they are observing the situation in present tense. I’m not sure about that, though, and it partially depends on how you write the next sentence after that – is the narrator back in the past then, or still experiencing the past in a more immediate way?

Passive voice means lack of action, everything happening passively. Examples:

Passive Voice: John was given a birthday cake.

Active Voice: Amy gave a birthday cake to John.

Better active voice because it’s more descriptive and more action’s involved: Amy carried a cake with bright blue icing. Eighteen candles flickered on top, throwing light and shadows upon her smiling face, as she sang Happy Birthday to John.

[Nick]

Honestly Nick doesn't understand all the hate passive voice receives. Sometimes passive voice works better. Not often, but sometimes. Plus, if you're writing dialogue, people tend to use passive voice, a lot. Generally the aforementioned sometimes is during dialogue or, like with your book, 1st person POV, but then it depends upon what you're writing and what sort of narrator you're going for. Unreliable narrator like Watson or Holden? Go square ahead. But, y'know, it varies and shiznez. Also you'd be surprised how handy passive voice can get when speaking Latin. But we're not speaking in Latin here, are we? (for the record, we totally should)

So, in regards to your initial question, going off that paragraph, yes'm change that har to a thar. Leastways in the instance of the first here. The latter here, well, I'd say leave it as here, but admittedly that's mostly because putting a "there" there just doesn't sound right. At the end of the day that's English for ya. Doesn't matter if it's wrong. If it sounds right, it's getting used.

[Holly]

Hello, Emily. Marilyn gave a wonderful answer, so I would study what she said.

I understand what you are saying. I would just rewrite it so I didn't have to figure it out!

"An old toilet squatted near the front door. Obviously there was no need for a toilet in the house with the unlikelihood of indoor plumbing up here, but why go to the trouble of hauling a commode all this way just to let it sit on the porch? It was like a hillbilly status symbol or something, reminding me of the senselessness of those ridiculous gold teeth the Petersburg boys wore to school – their teeth were fine and much prettier without them, but it proved they had money to waste, even though most of them didn’t. Funny how people are willing to go broke trying to prove that they aren't – even all the way up a mountain."

By saying "up a mountain" or "up a rural road" or something specific about location instead of "there" or "here," you can get around this.

Also, toilet squatted near the front door is kind of anthropomorphic. You could look at it as poetic writing, too, but I would rewrite to say someone had left an old toilet near the front door. I recently gave my manuscript to an editor, who got on me about that.

Good luck!

[Holly]

Honestly Nick doesn't understand all the hate passive voice receives. Sometimes passive voice works better. Not often, but sometimes.

I agree with Nick. In general, your writing is stronger if you use an active voice, but once in a blue moon a passive voice is okay (for example, if you don't want to reveal who or what is doing the action).

Lawyers and diplomats use passive voice all the time. They craft their language on purpose to sound vague and indirect. When someone uses passive voice in a contract or diplomatic speech, they leave loopholes and remove confrontation. Of course, that kind of language doesn't work so well when you're writing a novel.

[polymath]

Past tense represents a spectrum of time from immediate present past to some more remote in time time.

Present past action occurring in the immediately passed present;
The bowl bounced when it struck the floor, struck again, and shattered into a million jagged pieces.

More remote in time;
I broke the bowl yesterday.

The "here" or "there" question relates more to animacy in terms of proximity than person or tense. As far as perspective is concerned, animacy is a subtle feature infrequently consciously recognized in writing and reading. Pronouns like this and that, these and those and them, and here and there categorize proximity. When an egregious category error occurs, however, it stands out and can be disruptively confusing, or in many cases an intended rhetorical virtue.

In this instance "this" indicates as follows in proximity;
This he knows; all things are not what they seem.

In this next instance this refers to an antecedent and is potentially a category error;
Jeremy began the long climb back up the high sandy dune. This was the rough slog Bart warned him about.

However, that type of category error is not uncommon or necessarily an error. In the example "this" indicates an ongoing action.

Regardless, Holly already suggested a good workaround by modifying the here or there pronoun with a common noun. My suggestion is to consider a proper noun or an adjective or both that takes an attitude. //Funny how people are willing to go broke trying to prove that they aren’t – even all the way up here in backward Podunkville.//

Passive voice is a syntatical arrangement that places a sentence object in a subject position. Passive voice is also a matter of animacy. Rather than proximity, per se, though, passive voice is an obviative distancing of a subject's status by placing the subject in an object position or omitting the subject altogether. Conversely, an object in subject position places emphasis on the object, which is one of passive voice's useful purposes.

Passive voice construct;
The ball was thrown down the road [by the boy].

In that example, the ball is the object of the boy's action. However, it emphasizes the ball's importance by placing it in preeminent sentence position. Passive voice has a contributing place in writing, especially when applied for rhetorical purposes like relinquishing a subject to obviative status. Note that passive voice constructs typically take a to be auxilliary verb and a transitive verb form, but not exclusively so.

Passive voice, subject obviative status;
Excalibur couldn't be drawn from the stone by any of the realm's mighty knights.

[Nick]

Polymath, do you have access to the Great Library of Alexandria or something?

[polymath]

The Alexandria Library was a very limited repository by comparison with what the World Wide Web is becoming.

English language and rhetoric study are a couple of my several intellectual passions, and essential for my creative writing and vocational pursuits, if not essential for preserving my mental well-being.

[E McD]

Thank y'all so much.

I'm gonna go listen to Lynyrd Skynyrd's "Simple Man" now in hopes of rediscovering my ego. LOL

xo, Emily

[Nick]

English language and rhetoric study are a couple of my several intellectual passions, and essential for my creative writing and vocational pursuits, if not essential for preserving my mental well-being.

And apparently a sense of humor is not. Nah, just messin'. Not the sort of joke that really conveys well over text. S'all in the voice.

[polymath]

And apparently a sense of humor is not. Nah, just messin'. Not the sort of joke that really conveys well over text. S'all in the voice.

Sure, hyperbolous contexts used for overstatement are as likely to pass unnoticed as deadpan understatements are without body language and voice modulation to reinforce their humorous intents. Oh what an irony of ironies, what's meant to be said in writing cannot readily be expressed without a voice.