linguistic:paraphrasing
Legacy

I am not going to dictate to you what you write about my life and work. I only ask that you not make me out to be a 'whiner and sentimentalist.'

On 13 May 1935, in accordance with Piłsudski's last wishes, Edward Rydz-Śmigły was named by Poland's president and government to be Inspector General of the Polish Armed Forces, and on 10 November 1936, he was elevated to Marshal of Poland. As the Polish government became increasingly authoritarian and conservative, the Rydz-Śmigły faction was opposed by the more moderate Ignacy Mościcki, who remained President. Although Rydz-Śmigły reconciled with the President in 1938, the ruling group remained divided into the "President's Men", mostly civilians (the "Castle Group", after the President's official residence, Warsaw's Royal Castle), and the "Marshal's Men" (" Piłsudski's colonels "), professional military officers and Piłsudski's old comrades-in-arms. Some of this political division would continue in the Polish government-in-exile after the German invasion of Poland in 1939.

After World War II, little of Piłsudski's political ideology influenced the policies of the Polish People's Republic, a de facto satellite of the Soviet Union. For a decade after World War II, Piłsudski was either ignored or condemned by Poland's Communist government, along with the entire interwar Second Polish Republic. This began to change after de-Stalinization and the Polish October in 1956, and historiography in Poland gradually moved away from a purely negative view of Piłsudski toward a more balanced and neutral assessment. After the 1991 dissolution of the Soviet Union, Piłsudski once again came to be publicly acknowledged as a Polish national hero. On the sixtieth anniversary of his death on 12 May 1995, Poland's Sejm adopted a resolution:

"Józef Piłsudski will remain, in our nation's memory, the founder of its independence and the victorious leader who fended off a foreign assault that threatened the whole of Europe and its civilization. Józef Piłsudski served his country well and has entered our history forever."

Piłsudski continues to be viewed by most Poles as a providential figure in the country's 20th-century history.

Several military units have been named for Piłsudski, including the 1st Legions Infantry Division, armoured train No. 51 (" I Marszałek "—"the First Marshal"), and the Romanian 634th Infantry Battalion. Also named for Piłsudski have been Piłsudski's Mound, one of four-man-made mounds in Kraków; the Józef Piłsudski Institute of America, a New York City research center and museum on the modern history of Poland; the Józef Piłsudski University of Physical Education in Warsaw; a passenger ship, MS Piłsudski; a gunboat, ORP Komendant Piłsudski; and a racehorse, Pilsudski. Many Polish cities have their own "Piłsudski Street". There are statues of Piłsudski in many Polish cities; Warsaw, which has three in little more than a mile between the Belweder Palace, Piłsudski's residence, and Piłsudski Square. In 2020, Piłsudski's manor house in Sulejówek opened as a museum as part of the celebrations of the one hundredth anniversary of the Battle of Warsaw.

Piłsudski has been a character in numerous works of fiction, a trend already visible during his lifetime, including the 1922 novel Generał Barcz (General Barcz) by Juliusz Kaden-Bandrowski. Later works in which he is featured include the 2007 novel Ice (Lód) by Jacek Dukaj. Poland's National Library lists over 500 publications related to Piłsudski; the U.S. Library of Congress, over 300. Piłsudski's life was the subject of a 2001 Polish television documentary, Marszałek Piłsudski, directed by Andrzej Trzos-Rastawiecki. He was also the subject of paintings by artists such as Jacek Malczewski (1916) and Wojciech Kossak (leaning on his sword, 1928; and astride his horse, Kasztanka, 1928), as well as photos and caricatures. He has been reported to be quite fond of the latter.