Passive help needed!?

Question

1) Can a sentence have both passive and active parts?

2) If you see 'was' or 'were' followed by a past participle should you always think it is passive?

3) Is this a passive statement - "Both men were living in Paris when they met Gertrude Stein".
Why not?

"Both men were honoured in their lifetime."

4) Is this sentence Present Perfect Passive? - "He was invited last year. I wasn't."

5) "He had wanted to become a soldier, but couldn't because of his poor eyesight" - is this passive?

6) "His final years were taken up with alcohol and drug problems" - is this passive?

Thank you

Answer 1

Best Answer - Chosen by Voters

1. No, unless you include subclauses, like: "They worked all day and were kept busy."
2. Normally yes. I'm certain though that someone will come up with an example to the contrary.
3. No, it is the continuous form of the simple past, you can tell by the present participle "living" which is a constituent of an active verb.
"Both men..." is the subject of the sentence, and the action "were honoured" is done to them, so it's a passive.
4. It's the passive form of the simple past. The perfect form is "he has been invited"
5. No No form of "to be" in sight, it's actually pluperfect active.
6.Yes