How did Josef Stalin's childhood affect his future?

Answer 1

Joseph Stalin was beaten as a child by his drunken father. He also fell ill with small pox when he was six, leaving him with permenant marks on his face and leaving his left arm stiff. This caused him to be saved from the draft into the Russian army in 1916. Other than that, he attended Tiflis Theological Seminary where he discovered Marxist ideas and writings.

Answer 2

Well, he had smallpox and his legs were run over breaking both when a vehicle drove into the schoolyard where he was playing. Both events scarred him for life.

It is said his father was a drunk that frequently beat both him and his mother and was rarely home (but some have questioned the truth of this, claiming the story was exaggerated by Stalin if not entirely fabricated).

He was expelled from school for smuggling in and reading prohibited literature (both that prohibited by the Tsarist government and that prohibited by the even more restrictive rules of the Russian Orthodox Church based boarding school).