Abstract: Although the creation and publication of imperial poetry in the Qing dynasty presented an overall appearance of prosperity,the mechanisms for the poetry collections of emperors and imperial princes underwent changes during the Daoguang reign.The publication mechanism for imperial poetry collections,which took shape during the Qianlong era and standardized publication activities in the Jiaqing and Daoguang reigns,completely collapsed around the twelfth year of the Daoguang reign (1832).Observed from the perspective of literary creation,the degree of “collaborative composition” in Daoguang's imperial poetry is significantly lower than in Jiaqing's,reflecting a shift in the mode of text generation.Analyzed from the perspective of collection publication,the printing of poetry collections by imperial princes lacks relatively unified standards and suffers severe losses,suggesting a general indifference among princes towards their publication.The standardized and homogenized tendencies in the large-scale poetic series and “respectfully harmonizing” poems composed by the princes reflect that their poetic creation is heavily constrained by various precedents,possessing an inherently strong “passivity”.The manifestation of this attribute not only reveals the significance of imperial poetry in the Qing dynasty as a function of state symbolism but also provides a crucial perspective for us today to understand the unique literary phenomenon of its decline from prosperity during the Daoguang reign.

Key words: Qianlong, Jiaqing, Daoguang, imperial poetry