Direct, Precise, and Active Verbs

Direct, precise, active verbs energize writing. Consider this sentence with verbs in bold from “The Four Horsemen” by Grantland Rice (p. 610):

Yesterday the cyclone struck again as Notre Dame beat the Army, 13 to 7, with a set of backfield stars that ripped and crashed though a strong Army defense with more speed and power than the warring cadets could meet.

The verbs in Rice’s sentence re-create the high energy of the game. The rhetorical effect of the first three verbs is to move the sentence forward with such vigor and clarity that they vividly convey the force that overcame the strong Army defense. In addition, the verbs contribute to the highly energetic tone of the piece; in fact, they are a hallmark of Rice’s extravagant, even hyperbolic, style.

Now consider another passage, this one from “The Silent Season of a Hero” by Gay Talese (p. 592), with its verbs, verb phrases, and verbals (adjectives made from verbs) in bold type:

He watched until she left, lost in the crowd of the newly arrived tourists that had just come down the hill by cable car. Then he sat down again at the table in the restaurant, finishing his tea and lighting another cigarette, his fifth in the last half hour. It was 11:30 in the morning. None of the other tables was occupied, and the only sounds came from the bar, where a liquor salesman was laughing at something the headwaiter had said. But then the salesman, his briefcase under his arm, headed for the door, stopping briefly to peek into the dining room and call out, “See you later, Joe.” Joe DiMaggio turned and waved at the salesman. Then the room was quiet again.

Talese uses the action verbs, verb phrases, and verbals to give you a sense of the scene’s movement and drama. Yet the two shortest sentences—both emphasizing silence and stasis rather than movement—rely on the linking verb was.

Once you’ve learned to recognize effective verbs in your reading, you’ll become more aware of them in your own writing. You may find yourself working on the verbs in revisions rather than first drafts, but here are some suggestions for making even your first draft active and precise.

Direct Verbs

Use forms of to be and other linking verbs sparingly and with a specific reason. Often you can change a form of to be followed by a predicate adjective or a predicate noun (also called nominalization, see p. 781) into an action verb. Consider how the second sentence in each pair below sports a stronger verb than the first:

In England itself, whose shining empire seemed to be a testament to the imperial destiny of the Anglo-Saxon race, the fears for the inferiority of the nation’s fighting men had some empirical basis.

In England itself, whose shining empire seemed to testify to the imperial destiny of the Anglo-Saxon race, the fears for the inferiority of the nation’s fighting men had some empirical basis.

—Caroline Alexander

If you’re Henry Fonda’s son and you want to be an actor, you get to be an actor.

If you’re Henry Fonda’s son and you want to act, you get to act.

—Rick Reilly

If you’re Chelsea Clinton and want to be in government, you get to be in government.

If you’re Chelsea Clinton and want to govern, you get to govern.

—Rick Reilly

Precise Verbs

While there is nothing wrong with the verbs walks and looks in the first sentence that follows, consider the precision of the verbs in the second sentence.

As Emily walks onto the floor in her green-and-gold uniform, she looks for me.

As Emily bounces onto the floor in her green-and-gold uniform, her eyes scan the crowd to meet mine.

—Kris Vervaecke

Similarly, in the first sentence that follows, looking forward to is a perfectly serviceable verb—until you compare it with the more precise verb that the writer selects.

There must have been little boys in that throng too, frantic with the slow excruciating passage of time, looking forward to the hour when they would be Richard or Geoffrion or Laparade. . . .

There must have been little boys in that throng too, frantic with the slow excruciating passage of time, panting for the hour when they would be Richard or Geoffrion or Laprade. . . .

—William Faulkner

Active Verbs

In addition to selecting a verb that is direct and creates a precise image, use verbs in the active voice—with an easy-to-picture subject doing something—unless you have a specific purpose for using the passive voice, where the subject is acted upon. Here, for example, in the final part of a sentence from “The Silent Season of a Hero,” Gay Talese makes good use of the passive voice (p. 593, para. 10):

Zio Pepe was among those who cheered when Joe DiMaggio returned to San Francisco after his first season with the New York Yankees and was carried along the wharf on the shoulders of the fishermen.

In this sentence, DiMaggio is acted upon by the fishermen. Why? Perhaps because Talese wanted DiMaggio to remain as the subject instead of switching away from DiMaggio and making the fishermen the subject.

By and large, though, strong writers stick with the active voice, as Talese does in the following passage (p. 598, para. 54):

In the forty-first game [of 1941] . . . DiMaggio tied an American League record that George Sisler had set in 1922.

Talese could have cast that sentence in the passive voice, as follows:

In the forty-first game . . . an American League record that had been set by George Sisler in 1922 was tied by DiMaggio.

As is often the case, the use of passive voice in this example makes for a wordy sentence that is hard to follow.