I have to write an essay on book 1 of Gulliver's Travels on it being a satire. How does it relate to Utopia?I need to get a good thesis and my...

The author of Gulliver's Travels, Jonathan Swift, is one
of the most influential writers of satire in history.  Book One, the Voyage to Lilliput,
is perhaps the most popular.  On the surface, it is simply a travel document recounting
Gulliver's voyage to the strange land of little people.  However, the voyage is really
and investigation into the moral and intellectual smallness of
man.

Swift did equate physical size with moral and
intellectual bigness.  Thus, the Lilliputians exhibit moral and political decisions
which Swift finds laughable.   One such example is the way that individuals advance in
politicis. 

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When a great office is vacant, either by death
or disgrace (which often happens,) five or six of those candidates petition the emperor
to entertain his majesty and the court with a dance on the rope; and whoever jumps the
highest, without falling, succeeds in the office. Very often the chief ministers
themselves are commanded to show their skill, and to convince the emperor that they have
not lost their faculty.

 This
method obviously does not reward intelligence or virtue, and it may be compared to how
the King of England chose is chief advisors. 

Another
satirical example is the cause over the war between the Lilliputians and the
Blefescuans.  This cause is not due to differences in religious or political philosophy,
but in which end of an egg on should crack. 

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Which two mighty powers have, as I was going to
tell
you, been engaged in a most obstinate war for six-and-thirty
moons
past. It began upon the following occasion. It is allowed on
all
hands, that the primitive way of breaking
eggs

This shows the
trivialities of government who go to war and risk lives  quickly over
meaningless matters.

The novel relates to a utopia in that
Gulliver is evaluating, through each of his voyages, which areas of his travels are
worthy of imitating and which aren't.  Satire seeks to make fun of something or someone
to make a positive change.  Swift seems to be seeking the best of all worlds to create a
type of utopia.