I think it was the word "dead" that was bothering her.

The courts put life into the dead words of the statute.

In other words, not dead, but maybe even worse than dead.

They thought that literature was composed of dead words in books.

"As long as the word dead doesn't figure into that description, you're allowed to look."

I think this had to do with the language itself: there were no dead words.

She even thought "feminist" was a "dead and corrupt word" now that women had the right to earn a living.

How dismaying that in the future he would reach Mattie only with dead words on cold paper.

The etymologist finds the deadest word to have been once a brilliant picture.

Then a date, followed by the ominous words, Ship missing, all aboard presumed dead.