Niezwykłe przygody Don Kichota na nowo opowiedziane... : czyli „Jak nie polując, bo i po cóż miałby polować, Woroszylski grubego zwierza niepostrzeżenie ubił”

The Strange Adventures of Don Quixote Retold by Wiktor Woroszylski is a book that has been consistently mislabelled since its publication in 1983. It is described as an abbreviated version of Don Quixote for young readers, probably because of its publisher Nasza Księgarnia specializes in children's books. In fact, however, Woroszylski's the book plays a sophisticated literary game with the original using a whole bag of postmodernist tricks. Like Foucault, Woroszylski does not believe in Quixote's deathbed renunciation of chivalry and conversion to common sense. Nor does he go with the narrator's account of the knight errant's death. In this and many other instances he blames the original author for ignorance. As a result, he takes over and retells the story from a diametrically opposite point of view. Woroszylski's text is thus a supplement and a corrective of the original. The article examines the techniques used to by him to achieve his goals. It also tries to shed more light on his decision to stand up to Cervantes and to position this novel in Woroszylski's oeuvre. Finally, the article considers the effect the reassessment of this novel would have for the history of contemporary Polish fiction.