  This article presents the results of a study involving the translation of a
fictional story from English into Catalan in three modalities:
machine-translated (MT), post-edited (MTPE) and translated without aid (HT).
Each translation was analysed to evaluate its creativity. Subsequently, a
cohort of 88 Catalan participants read the story in a randomly assigned
modality and completed a survey. The results show that HT presented a higher
creativity score if compared to MTPE and MT. HT also ranked higher in narrative
engagement, and translation reception, while MTPE ranked marginally higher in
enjoyment. HT and MTPE show no statistically significant differences in any
category, whereas MT does in all variables tested. We conclude that creativity
is highest when professional translators intervene in the process, especially
when working without any aid. We hypothesize that creativity in translation
could be the factor that enhances reading engagement and the reception of
translated literary texts.
