If subversion is the questioning of the relevance of a model or a posture, to what extent does the translation of a subversive novel—pilloried by the guardians of the traditional order of things—, fulfill its role by opening up the possibilities of the original, by freeing itself from the translational norms of its time, and by giving reader a chance to apprehend the singularity and universality of the Other? One way is to move away from dualisms informed by the principle of separation/exclusion that lead to cultural homogenisation and over-identification. Translators must choose how to negotiate the decentering that takes place between the source language-culture and the target language-culture, according to their representation of the reader, construed either as open to the universal or, conversely, eager to open up to distant horizons, in a way that nonetheless remains familiar. To what extent does the French version of Egyptian author El Aswany’s novel, J’ai couru vers le Nil (Actes Sud, 2018), translated by Gilles Gauthier, convey the original’s subversive style and content? Rather than pointing to the inadequacies of his translation, our objective is to analyse the representational issues it raises and their effects on the target culture’s image of the Other. We will present the strategies used by Gauthier in certain passages, in order to shed light on his posture with regard to otherness.