Example: “That treasure lying in its bed of coral, and the corpse of the
commander floating sideways on the bridge,
were evoked by historians
as
an emblem of the city drowned in memories.” —Gabriel García
Márquez,
Love in the Time of Cholera
Here, you could invert the sentence to say “Historians evoked that
treasure (and so on).” But that would take the focus away from that oh-
so-intriguing treasure and the corpse. And since the historians are less
important here, the author makes the choice to stress the key idea of the
sentence through the passive voice.
Tense
Auxiliary verb + sample V3
(past participle)
Examples
Wine is made from
Present
simple
am,
is,
are
grapes.
+ made
Many cars are made in
Japan.
The document is being
Present am,
progressive sent
is,
are
+
being
+
sent right now.
I am being sent to
work in the London
office.