EN
The article concerns the short story which is interpreted as „the work of rupture”, because it finished a romantic and also positivistic period in career of Bolesław Prus. In „The sins of childhood” the author deconstructs ideology of positivism, showing that all arguments depend on social position of the speaker; he is also deconstructing romatic and post-romantic myth of totally uninfluenced child who is an artist or a prophet. The story has a form of a confession, which is made by old man about his adolescence. In this relation it is possible to distinguish two kinds of vulnerability that is experienced by main character (Kazimierz) and his fellows. The first one is physical, bodily. It may by observed in the school where one pupil is persecuted by others because he is week, gibbous and fearful. The second kind of vulnerability is psychological: it concerns the question of desire. In the school and at home Kazimierz wants to be adored and appreciated and this is why he seeks for a friend among his fellows. Kazimierz finds such persons but the relationship with them (i.e. with one pupil and countess' daughter) only at the beginning has this direction – when some time has passed Kazimierz becomes subordinated to them; he copies and adores them. The most tragical moments of his life are when he looses his friends. The father is not a model (he has no authority) for him, that is why Kazimierz depends only on his equals. Their lack is experienced by him as being close to nothingness.