The holomorphic couch theorem (Q1637297)

Baer proved in the 1920's that any two homotopic simple closed curves on a compact surface are in fact isotopic. Epstein proved that any two homotopic orientation-preserving homeomorphic embeddings of a (orientable) surface in another (orientable) surface are isotopic. In the paper under review, the author shows that any two homotopic conformal embeddings of finite Riemann surfaces are homotopic through conformal embeddings. Here, a finite Riemann surface is one with finitely generated fundamental group, equivalently, a compact surface with some finite collection of points and disks removed. The main tools used are the geometry of quadratic differentials and Ioffe's theorem (which the author points out an error in the proof of and subsequently gives a corrected proof) showing that maps of minimal quasiconformal dilatation in their homotopy classes are Teichmüller embeddings.