  We prove that every continuous map from a Stein manifold X to a complex
manifold Y can be made holomorphic by a homotopic deformation of both the map
and the Stein structure on X. In the absence of topological obstructions the
holomorphic map may be chosen to have pointwise maximal rank. The analogous
result holds for any compact Hausdorff family of maps, but it fails in general
for a noncompact family. Our main results are actually proved for smooth almost
complex source manifolds (X,J) with the correct handlebody structure. The paper
contains another proof of Eliashberg's (Int J Math 1:29--46, 1990) homotopy
characterization of Stein manifolds and a slightly different explanation of the
construction of exotic Stein surfaces due to Gompf (Ann Math 148 (2):619--693,
1998; J Symplectic Geom 3:565--587, 2005). (See also the related preprint
math/0509419).
