After we left school, few of us remembered what an infinitive was. Editors will remind you.
Let's review: The infinitive of a verb is its basic form with or without the particle to: do/to do and be/to be.
1) An infinitive verb almost always begins with to followed by the simple form of the verb.
Examples:
Dick likes to run often.
Dick wants to fly planes.
Dick used to walk to work.
2) An infinitive is not doing the work of the verb of the sentence. Don't add s, es, ed, or ing to the end.
Dick (subject) likes (verb) to run (infinitive) often.
3) Infinitives can be used as nouns, adjectives, or adverbs.
Noun: To jam with the band after work was Dick's incentive to get through the day.Adjective: The only way Dick would survive his boring job was to dream about his gig at the bar.Adverb: Dick, an aspiring songwriter, suffered through his job at the tax office to pay for necessitities until his big break arrived.
4) A split infinitive is inserting a word between to and the verb.
Incorrect: Sally wanted to thoroughly kiss him.
Correct: Sally wanted to kiss him thoroughly.
For effect: Sally wanted to kiss him, thoroughly.
This rule is broken frequently. If you choose to split infinitives, do it intentionally and for emphasis, not because you don't understand the rule.
Revision Tips:
You can search and kill for the word to.
Make sure you type in the search window: (space)to(space).
Otherwise, you will bring up every combination of the letters t and o. The sheer volume may crash your computer.
You could also search and kill for word pairs: wanted to, tried to, ought to, used to, liked to, etc.
Make a list of your favorite bugaboos and prune them into shape.
For all of the revision tips on verbs and other revision layers, pick up a copy of:
1) A single, active verb is more effective than passive verbs or passive verbs paired with adjectives.
Search and kill as many passive verbs as you can. Look for: am, is, are, was, were, being, be, been and any verb ending in -ing. A few passive verbs in a manuscript is fine; a few in a paragraph aren't.
2) Starting a phrase with a passive -ing verb implies the two things happened simultaneously.
Dick danced, twirling plates on his head, and singing a song.
Dick twirled plates on his head as he danced and sang.
Dick could potentially do those things at the same time if he was truly talented.
Picking up her briefcase and locking the door, Sally rushed off to work.
Sally can't pick up her brief case, lock the door, and rush off to work all at the same time. The sentence should read:
Sally picked up her briefcase, locked the door then rushed to work.
If the items cannot happen simultaneously, change it.
3) There is a difference between passive voice and past tense.
Past tense means the action already occurred.
Passive voice has to do with who did or did not do something. It almost always includes forms of the verb to be. In active voice, the subject does something. In the passive voice, something is done to the subject.
It is generally considered better to use active rather than passive verbs.
4) In the revision phase, as you read the sentences, identify the subject and verb.
Does the subject of the verb perform the action of the main verb or does he sit there while something or someone else performs the action? If the subject performs the verb, it is active. If it doesn’t, it’s passive.
Passive: The victim was drowned around midnight.
Active: The murderer drowned the victim around midnight.
Passive: Jane was scratched by Puff.
Active: Puff scratched Jane.
In instances when the writer does not know the doerof the verb, the doer is not important, or there are many doers, it is acceptable to use passive verbs.
If you intentionally obscure whodunit, you might say, “Dick was murdered.” If you say, “It was just lying there,” you have indicated that it doesn’t matter who left it lying there or why.
5) A character might always speak passively as a quirk.
6) Linking verbs indicate a state of being, not action.
Do a search for:is, was, are, seems, becomes. These are red flags.
7) Passive verbs and modifiers shouldn’t be mixed.
If you begin a sentence with a modifying phrase, it becomes a dangling modifier if you follow it with a passive verb.
Sighing softly, the book was placed on the table.
The sentence forgot to mention who sighed and placed the book on the table. Supplying the missing who turns it into an active sentence.
Sighting softly, Jane placed the book on the table.
Jane sighed softly and placed the book on the table.
Revising for passive verbs is a tedious chore. However, the more you practice using verbs correctly, the more natural it will become.
For more information on revision and proper verb usage, check out Story Building Blocks III: The Revision Layers. I don't revise a book without it.
Literary prizes normally seem tame affairs. Well, at their outset, perhaps. This year, the Booker prize seems to have attracted controversy as various authors debated the use of present tense. (Three of six books listed on the Man Booker Prize are written in present tense.)
Admittedly, I have yet to read any of the Booker prize books in question. But the debate did get me to open several of my books stacked at my bedside. I was seeking out their tenses. I wanted to figure out if I have preponderance to present tense books or to past tense books...or if I had even noticed. In the debate, present tense is considered more "fashionable," although it has been used for centuries.
I know I've tried to carry off present tense in some of my fiction and find it much more difficult. The immediacy present brings to a scene often dissipates the nuances I like in using past tense. But frequently I've been won over by my characters wanting to speak in present tense. In those instances, I try to let the story tell itself, without criticizing it for being in present tense. Just as a story of mine might lend itself to a certain point of view more than another POV and only trial and error (read: revision, revision, revision) will tell. Unfortunately, I don't believe I'm as skilled at writing in present tense as I am in past tense.
It was mentioned that maybe the use of present tense comes from creative writing classes. Maybe so. But I've found that I may have practiced and learned various crafts and techniques in my MFA classes, but, as a writer, I need to stick with what works. Right now, past tense works for the stories I’m trying to tell and it’s what I will gravitate toward.
However, the debate certainly makes me want to seek out these books and take the present tense writers for a test drive.
What about you? How do you feel about the present versus past tense debate? Are you feeling any tension one way or another?
Elizabeth King Humphrey is a writer who lives in North Carolina.
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Like you I tend to write in past tense as, I think, that's what I've been brought up on. While I have dabbled in present tense I haven't read much of it and honestly don't find it that appealing (unless it's written exceptionally well) as often it jarrs with the story being told.