That was an excellent lesson. If you can make such an engaging story with random noun generators, application of your technique, and still have the audience (evidenced by my experience) emotionally invested in judging the characters' mindsets and finding one of them to be a hero for fighting for his principles, despite being humorously whimsical, then you possess existential skill! I have a few questions, but first, if we may address whether we can agree on a definition, it may help. I consider a good writer to be one that accomplishes a purposeful goal of communicating a constructive (long term at least) message PLUS actively engages the audience like a good teacher that uses writing rather than lectures, but commands audience through genuine interest in the subject and trust in the teacher's qualifications rather than authority. By that standard, if we can agree in some form, 1) how would a good writer address tense? It seems that with a narrative, a story is being told that depends on using past tense. In a treatise, it seems that present tense is more appropriate but would likely result in a lot of "is" statements to establish what is true. 2) Do you have any tips for someone that may be internally hampered by writing/speaking in active voice by an adopted (whether fully embraced or correct or not) habit of tempering communications with humility that often prompts towards passive voice? For example, I began this comment by saying "that was an excellent lesson" and if I accepted your lesson and instantly applied the technique, I might state something more like "I was very interested by this video and appreciate the information." But (and not trying to be arrogant by acting like I am the most humble person in the world (haha), if I decided against applying that edit because I didn't want to make my comment about myself, but to encourage you, share with any other readers of this comment my appreciation as evidence that if the other students listen just as intently, there is great value in the lesson, and offering detailed analysis of why it was valuable to reinforce just in case there were any skeptics. That sort of thought process actually occurred, and maybe it is more indicative of a problematic way of thinking, but maybe it works and the communication can just be improved to be active voice regardless. Your thoughts would be appreciated on that as well, but one more question... 3) It was stated in this video that the dentist's actions were shown to be something like absurd or unreasonable. While this again may hint at a different way of viewing the world if I don't condemn the dentist's actions in any way (other than using the Lord's name in vain and not being a little more gentle with the girl), I'm curious about how to write in the active voice with actions that might be interpreted as ridiculous/unreasonable/absurd/etc. but meant to be taken seriously, since I must have misinterpreted the story as told originally before it was specified that it was meant to be absurdist/humorous.
Thanks Dan, glad you enjoyed it! I like to think I'm getting a little better with each one of these videos I make. As to what constitutes a "good" writer (a lot of which you covered in your own definition), I'd say, on its most fundamental level, it comes down to this: does the reader of said writing feel/understand what the writer was trying to convey? Whether it be excitement, fear, hope, love, or some philosophical epiphany, the "better" the writer, the less is lost in translation. 1) I don't have experience writing treatises, so I'm not sure what would be the best tense there, but I will say that when it comes to statements of truth, using those "is" sentence structures is fine, so long as their not used one after the other (unless they directly relate to one another). And the passive voice may not even be a problem in such a work of literature, because the active voice is primarily used to convey sequences of events in a very immediate way, which is why it's essential to story telling. In fiction, you can use either tense (past or present), although past is probably more common. The present tense does have an even more immediate feel to it, but I suspect the writer would be limited in the number of techniques he/she can use (though I haven't written a great deal in the present tense). For example, conveying the passage of extended periods of time in the present tense would be challenging. 2) Again, I should state (and perhaps should be more explicit in the videos themselves) that the advice/techniques I'm giving are largely intended to be applied to narrative writing/story telling. When it comes to communication between two people, as in your example "that was an excellent lesson," it's totally fine to use the passive voice. Now, in order to apply the active voice to that sentence in a narrative framework (let's say you were trying to convey that a particular lesson a character learned was excellent), you might say: "John bowed his head, humbled by the lesson." This is active (John bowed) and SHOWS that the lesson was well received and impactful. John's actions (and thus the sentence) would vary depending on the nature of the lesson, but the active voice would remain in order to show his reaction to it. So don't worry about writing like this outside of a narrative framework, especially in speech, but I guess it still could be done. For example, you could say: "That lesson opened my eyes to much." Here, "the lesson" is the subject, "opened" the active verb performed by "the lesson", and "my eyes" the object that the action is being performed on. But you may be able to see how speaking/communicating directly like this has its limitations, and the active voice here can't really be used exclusively. 3) Looking back at that story and how I wrote it, I can see how it may not have been obvious that it was intended to be a bit humorous, because while Shane's actions are absurd, the writing is not. "Over the top" may be a better word to describe the story than humorous, and perhaps I was so close to the story that it was only funny to me haha. As to how it can go the other way, in that actions intended by the writer to be serious are understood as humorous by the reader, I think it comes down to the motivations of the characters in question to a large extent. For example, in my little story, the dentist was literally willing to fight to the DEATH over a tooth, and the raccoons were shown to be more cunning than real animals are capable of being (holding the tooth ransom and pointing at the muffins). If he had, say, fought to the death over protecting his child, then the reader would understand that this is serious, even if the raccoons behaved humanly. In my story, it was essentially the premise that made the whole thing absurd (in my eyes, at least).
I'd also like to add (regarding my description of a "good" writer) that being able to articulate profound things that everyone knows deep down but have trouble putting into words, is also the hallmark of a "good" writer (and a good thinker, more fundamentally). Essentially, the ability to make complex things simple, and use few words to convey them (which comes down to being concise).
@@coreyhuffman7607 Dan bowed his head until his back hurt a little more... embraced a little pain to make an honest gesture. He chose his final words carefully: appreciation & intent to commit to memory.
6:44 I would like to point out in your sample of how not to do this paragraph, which is quite terrible (bravo! Nailed it!), that not everything you’re calling passive voice qualifies according to your definition. Not that I’m defending the passive voice, I just want your next video to be clearer. The first second and last sentences certainly are passive, but a sentence such as “Shane was frustrated“ is simply a descriptor. Shane equals a frustrated person. It’s telling and and weak, but it’s not the passive voice. Shane is still the subject and not the object of the sentence. “The girl was crying” is simply the imperfect tense, which is sometimes useful, because if we use the perfect tense, “she cried“ we need to add something such as “when he pulled the molar“ or “at the funeral“. A passive sentence would read something like “Tears were shed by the girl.” Also, one of the main problems with this paragraph, that you could mention, is that the subject changes with almost every sentence. It would be like watching a scene in a movie with a dizzying number of cuts. Of course, you may want to look at your better version because you change the subject a few times in that one as well and I wonder if you want that. It pulls us out of tight POV and gives importance to a girl you didn’t think was significant enough to name.
Thank you for your feedback! You're right, calling those sentences "passive" is not technically correct. I guess I tend to conflate "telling" with the passive voice because both have a "soft" feel to them. I'll be sure to correct this in a future video.
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Hey! I like your videos. I hope you’re making more! Kudos.
Love the story!
Entertaining and instructive. Thank you.
That was an excellent lesson. If you can make such an engaging story with random noun generators, application of your technique, and still have the audience (evidenced by my experience) emotionally invested in judging the characters' mindsets and finding one of them to be a hero for fighting for his principles, despite being humorously whimsical, then you possess existential skill!
I have a few questions, but first, if we may address whether we can agree on a definition, it may help. I consider a good writer to be one that accomplishes a purposeful goal of communicating a constructive (long term at least) message PLUS actively engages the audience like a good teacher that uses writing rather than lectures, but commands audience through genuine interest in the subject and trust in the teacher's qualifications rather than authority. By that standard, if we can agree in some form, 1) how would a good writer address tense? It seems that with a narrative, a story is being told that depends on using past tense. In a treatise, it seems that present tense is more appropriate but would likely result in a lot of "is" statements to establish what is true. 2) Do you have any tips for someone that may be internally hampered by writing/speaking in active voice by an adopted (whether fully embraced or correct or not) habit of tempering communications with humility that often prompts towards passive voice? For example, I began this comment by saying "that was an excellent lesson" and if I accepted your lesson and instantly applied the technique, I might state something more like "I was very interested by this video and appreciate the information." But (and not trying to be arrogant by acting like I am the most humble person in the world (haha), if I decided against applying that edit because I didn't want to make my comment about myself, but to encourage you, share with any other readers of this comment my appreciation as evidence that if the other students listen just as intently, there is great value in the lesson, and offering detailed analysis of why it was valuable to reinforce just in case there were any skeptics. That sort of thought process actually occurred, and maybe it is more indicative of a problematic way of thinking, but maybe it works and the communication can just be improved to be active voice regardless. Your thoughts would be appreciated on that as well, but one more question... 3) It was stated in this video that the dentist's actions were shown to be something like absurd or unreasonable. While this again may hint at a different way of viewing the world if I don't condemn the dentist's actions in any way (other than using the Lord's name in vain and not being a little more gentle with the girl), I'm curious about how to write in the active voice with actions that might be interpreted as ridiculous/unreasonable/absurd/etc. but meant to be taken seriously, since I must have misinterpreted the story as told originally before it was specified that it was meant to be absurdist/humorous.
Thanks Dan, glad you enjoyed it! I like to think I'm getting a little better with each one of these videos I make. As to what constitutes a "good" writer (a lot of which you covered in your own definition), I'd say, on its most fundamental level, it comes down to this: does the reader of said writing feel/understand what the writer was trying to convey? Whether it be excitement, fear, hope, love, or some philosophical epiphany, the "better" the writer, the less is lost in translation.
1) I don't have experience writing treatises, so I'm not sure what would be the best tense there, but I will say that when it comes to statements of truth, using those "is" sentence structures is fine, so long as their not used one after the other (unless they directly relate to one another). And the passive voice may not even be a problem in such a work of literature, because the active voice is primarily used to convey sequences of events in a very immediate way, which is why it's essential to story telling. In fiction, you can use either tense (past or present), although past is probably more common. The present tense does have an even more immediate feel to it, but I suspect the writer would be limited in the number of techniques he/she can use (though I haven't written a great deal in the present tense). For example, conveying the passage of extended periods of time in the present tense would be challenging.
2) Again, I should state (and perhaps should be more explicit in the videos themselves) that the advice/techniques I'm giving are largely intended to be applied to narrative writing/story telling. When it comes to communication between two people, as in your example "that was an excellent lesson," it's totally fine to use the passive voice. Now, in order to apply the active voice to that sentence in a narrative framework (let's say you were trying to convey that a particular lesson a character learned was excellent), you might say: "John bowed his head, humbled by the lesson." This is active (John bowed) and SHOWS that the lesson was well received and impactful. John's actions (and thus the sentence) would vary depending on the nature of the lesson, but the active voice would remain in order to show his reaction to it. So don't worry about writing like this outside of a narrative framework, especially in speech, but I guess it still could be done. For example, you could say: "That lesson opened my eyes to much." Here, "the lesson" is the subject, "opened" the active verb performed by "the lesson", and "my eyes" the object that the action is being performed on. But you may be able to see how speaking/communicating directly like this has its limitations, and the active voice here can't really be used exclusively.
3) Looking back at that story and how I wrote it, I can see how it may not have been obvious that it was intended to be a bit humorous, because while Shane's actions are absurd, the writing is not. "Over the top" may be a better word to describe the story than humorous, and perhaps I was so close to the story that it was only funny to me haha. As to how it can go the other way, in that actions intended by the writer to be serious are understood as humorous by the reader, I think it comes down to the motivations of the characters in question to a large extent. For example, in my little story, the dentist was literally willing to fight to the DEATH over a tooth, and the raccoons were shown to be more cunning than real animals are capable of being (holding the tooth ransom and pointing at the muffins). If he had, say, fought to the death over protecting his child, then the reader would understand that this is serious, even if the raccoons behaved humanly. In my story, it was essentially the premise that made the whole thing absurd (in my eyes, at least).
I'd also like to add (regarding my description of a "good" writer) that being able to articulate profound things that everyone knows deep down but have trouble putting into words, is also the hallmark of a "good" writer (and a good thinker, more fundamentally). Essentially, the ability to make complex things simple, and use few words to convey them (which comes down to being concise).
@@coreyhuffman7607 Dan bowed his head until his back hurt a little more... embraced a little pain to make an honest gesture. He chose his final words carefully: appreciation & intent to commit to memory.
Hilarious story btw.
Thanks, glad you got a kick out of it haha. Always fun to write an absurd premise in a serious tone.
6:44
I would like to point out in your sample of how not to do this paragraph, which is quite terrible (bravo! Nailed it!), that not everything you’re calling passive voice qualifies according to your definition. Not that I’m defending the passive voice, I just want your next video to be clearer.
The first second and last sentences certainly are passive, but a sentence such as “Shane was frustrated“ is simply a descriptor. Shane equals a frustrated person. It’s telling and and weak, but it’s not the passive voice. Shane is still the subject and not the object of the sentence.
“The girl was crying” is simply the imperfect tense, which is sometimes useful, because if we use the perfect tense, “she cried“ we need to add something such as “when he pulled the molar“ or “at the funeral“. A passive sentence would read something like “Tears were shed by the girl.”
Also, one of the main problems with this paragraph, that you could mention, is that the subject changes with almost every sentence. It would be like watching a scene in a movie with a dizzying number of cuts.
Of course, you may want to look at your better version because you change the subject a few times in that one as well and I wonder if you want that. It pulls us out of tight POV and gives importance to a girl you didn’t think was significant enough to name.
Thank you for your feedback! You're right, calling those sentences "passive" is not technically correct. I guess I tend to conflate "telling" with the passive voice because both have a "soft" feel to them. I'll be sure to correct this in a future video.