[...] technologies can sometimes be useful to literary translators as well, says Bowker. “They can compile a list of an author’s favourite expressions, as well as sentences or words that were translated in earlier works. By cataloguing neologisms or lexical creations so that they can be compared with a larger sample, technology can help the translator decide whether a more creative approach is warranted.” Bowker concludes that these technologies should be regarded as tools, not as potential competitors: “Human translators will never run out of work.”
The magazine of the University of Ottawa

First of all: What is a CAT tool? Yes, WikiPedia has it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer-assisted_translation It’s a software tool that helps translators doing their work. A lot of people call it “Translation Memory System” while I would rather call it “Translation Environment” (TE). Anyway, it’s all the same.
The first book I translated using a TE was the children’s book Mozart in the Future written by my wife in Brazilian Portuguese which I translated into German. Now I am translating my second book written by another Brazilian author. My wife will have to wait. She is already waiting in line with her second children’s book The Legend of the Black Lake. When I find the time I will translate that one, too, using a TE, of course!

Why do I use a CAT tool at all?

The COO of a company that produces and sells a TE asked me this question. Well, here is the answer: You don’t have to, actually. If you have always walked to the bakery which is less than half a mile away, why should you use a car instead? If you always talked to your neighbor personally, why should you call him using a cell phone?
Okay, this is not a philosophical question. I would say that “older” literary translators probably would feel more comfortable without a TE. Computer-savvy and rather “young” translators would and should use a TE. (What about the old and computer-savvy translators?) Here is why.
First of all so