Plumbs Defy: Active Verbs And Why We Use Them

It's been almost a year since my last (and first) update, but here I am at the keyboard again, reared and ready to get tapping away. So without further ado, today's topic 'Plumbs Defy: active verbs and why we use them'.

on the face of it 'Plumbs defy' has no no meaning, and in a literal sense it doesn't; but many people use it to reference the structure of how active verbs should be used. Here's how:

Instead of using 'plumbs defy' lets look at some examples of active sentences that makes a little more sense. 'Books open'. That's an active sentence. So is 'dogs walk' and 'birds fly'. Are you beginning to see a pattern develop? No. Okay, let me explain it to you.

Verbs are doing words right? Most people know this. But what is an active verb? An active verb is a verb in a sentence where the subject of the sentence is doing the action; As opposed to passive verbs that are are verbs in a sentence in which the subject has the action done to it.

Here are some examples of the difference between active sentences and passive sentences:

'Jacob jumped over the wall' is active.

'The wall was jumped over by Jacob' is passive.

'The tree fell and hit the ground' is active

'The ground was hit by the falling tree' is passive

Sentences that use active verbs deliver a much more powerful punch than those that use passive verbs, which can often make writing seem dull, energetic and impersonal. The reason I use 'plumbs defy'¹ is because it's a very strange sentence, and therefore easy to remember.

[1]'plumbs defy' is taken from Stephen kings' book 'on writing'