Was I A Passive Writer

While pursuing my morning writing routine, I began reflecting on a feedback exchange from last night. It caused me to stop typing mid-sentence on the word was. In lieu of my monthly short story, I present:

Was I A Passive Writer

The architecture of the English language is scaffolded with numerous unwavering principles. So important are these, that without them, we’d be incomprehensible. Part of our language development is through repetition and contextual associations. This is an essential framework, but ultimately, we outgrow those strategies, and they become habits we need to break. To tell a compelling story, we must be engaging. And to be engaging, we mustn’t be passive.

Was that passive, or did we have a misunderstanding?

Even. Just. Must. Were. Was.

All exceptional words and powerful when leveraged properly. We use them in conversation all the time. And although speech and writing are closely related, they are not the same thing.

As we develop our writing skills, we must remember that it is possible to overshoot our initial understanding, falling back into that contextual trap and locking in on shorthand philosophies that, while well-meaning, undermine that development.

Was is only a bad word when you don’t know how to use it or when someone thinks you’re using it wrong. But don’t CTRL+F your document for was just yet. There is a broad misconception that was is passive in all of its uses. This isn’t true. Passive voice can be easily diagnosed.

Consider this sentence:

“The door was opened by Martha.”

It works, but the reader can tell it isn’t quite right. And that’s for a few reasons. The first is that the subject, Martha, is the recipient of the action. All good protagonists do. Agency is key. Another reason is that the actor is absent, hidden, or secondary. If the story were about a mythical door and it were the narrative’s primary focus, this sentence would be exceptional. Imagine the hinges creaking. Good, right? But if we’re following Martha as she dissects a complex murder in a rundown mansion, this simply won’t do.

I was tired. I was walking. And the rain was falling.

A writer could be poetic and elaborate, but these are all perfectly serviceable examples of active was.

Reader’s attention is a premium currency that we must consider when consciously editing. Is a verb always necessary to establish tone or build suspense?

Compare the qualities of: the hallway hummed with silence and the hallway was silent. The first example provides context for two of the senses, while the second focuses on one. Hummed could come across incongruent with silence, or the reader could infer that Martha is having a physical reaction to the strain and fear associated with the investigation. What might be behind that closed door at the end of the silent hallway? Either example gets Martha from point A to point B with agency. The real question here is of texture, not passivity.

Take your favorite book down from the shelf, or finally open one from your precipitous TBR pile and look inside. How long does it take you to find an instance of was?

In the first book of Stephen King’s Dark Tower series, The Gunslinger, was appears in the second sentence.

“The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.
The desert was the apotheosis of all deserts, huge, standing to the sky for what might have been parsecs in all directions.”

The Gunslinger – Stephen King

The King James version of the Bible contains was twice within the first two verses.

“In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.”

King James Bible

No second fiddle to was was God.

Looking at my current project, At the Bottom, an adult Science Fiction novel that focuses on a post-scarcity society balanced between greed and faith, I found was almost immediately.

“I brushed away the amber swarm of proximity warnings in my heads-up display like so many buzzing flies. The crowd bulged but didn’t break. So far, everyone was peaceful, despite the protestors and obligatory counter-protestors.”

At the Bottom – Ryan Dailey

You don’t have to be God, or even Stephen King, to use was effectively. Put the character first, and the reader will follow. This doesn’t only apply to tense. We are attracted to compelling characters who make a conscious effort to change the world they live in. Was is a tool for agency. So long as writers use it to support the subject, you can be sure they’re using it properly.