Emperor Qianlong's literary inquisition began with the "pseudo-Sun Jiagan's manuscript case" in the sixteenth year of Qianlong. Literary inquisition embodies all kinds of disadvantages under the rule of the emperor in feudal period. There used to be a literary inquisition in Qianlong, but the early literary inquisition was not large in scale, involving a small number of people and a relatively small scale. However, in the Northern Song Dynasty, literary inquisitions began to appear on a large scale. The most famous literary inquisition Wutai poetry case in history occurred in the Northern Song Dynasty.

In the second year of Yuanfeng, a Wutai poetry case occurred, and the suggestion impeached Su Dongpo, accusing the emperor Su Shi of hidden satire in Huzhou Xie Shangbiao. Then other ministers said that Su Shi "had no academic background at the beginning, gained fame at that time, and accidentally studied different subjects, so he went to Confucian Academy". So that Su Shi was eventually demoted to Huangzhou. Down and out, his friends are also implicated.

As a matter of fact, literary inquisitions have existed throughout the ages, but historians generally believe that literary inquisitions were the most popular in the Qing Dynasty. Emperor Qianlong alone sentenced more than 130 literary prisons, many of which were literati, who were wronged and demoted. Suffer from it. The literary inquisition in Qing Dynasty originated in the emperor shunzhi, and since then, there has been a new official title, which is the legendary word inspector. After that, the literary inquisition intensified and reached its peak during the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty.

But many literary inquisitions are groundless and have no real judgment. Many people will be sentenced to death or accused of implicating others, so there are countless murders by the sword. The royal family fought fiercely in the Qing dynasty, and the emperor wanted to block the long crowd with the literary inquisition. But it has exerted an indelible influence on China literature.