A steel awl with a wooden handle, traditionally used in hand typesetting to pry up and remove incorrect characters from a fully composed block of type. Because using it carelessly can scratch the printing face of adjacent letters, skilled compositors prefer to loosen the line and lift characters with their fingers.
Heard on the job
Hand me the bodkin, I need to fish out this upside-down 'e' before we pull another proof.
Insider tip
A heavy-handed compositor leaves a trail of scratched typefaces; the bodkin should only grip the shoulder of the type.