social phenomena. Balzac then professes his belief in two profound truths — religion and monarchy — and his concern for understanding the individual in the context of his family. In the last half of his preface, Balzac explains the Comédie humaines different parts (which he compares to "frames" and "galeries"), and which are more or less the final form of the collection (see below). Sources of the Comédie humaine Because of its volume and complexity, the Comédie humaine touches on the major literary genres in fashion in the first half of the 19th century. The historical novel The historical novel was a European phenomenon in the first half of the 19th century — largely through the works of Sir Walter Scott, James Fenimore Cooper and, in France, Alexandre Dumas, père and Victor Hugo. Balzac's first novel Les Chouans was inspired by this vogue and tells of the rural inhabitants of Brittany during the revolution with Cooper-like descriptions of their dress and manners. Although the bulk of the Comédie humaine takes place during the Restoration and the July Monarchy, there are several novels which take place during the French Revolution and others which take place in the Middle Ages or the Renaissance, including "About Catherine de Medici" and "The Elixir of Long Life". The popular novel Balzac's later works are decidedly influenced by the genre of the serialised novel ("roman feuilleton") popular at the time, especially the works of Eugène Sue which concentrate on depicting the secret worlds of crime and vice that hide below the surface of French society, and by the ethos of melodrama typical of these part-works. Fantasy Many of Balzac's shorter works have elements taken from the popular "roman noir" or gothic novel, but often the fantastic elements are used for very different purposes in Balzac's work. His use of the magical ass' skin in La Peau de chagrin for example becomes a metaphor for diminished male potency and a key symbol of Balzac's conception of energy and will in the modern world. In a similar way, Balzac undermines the character of Melmoth the Wanderer in his "Melmoth Reconciled": Balzac takes a character from a fantastic novel (by Charles Robert Maturin) who has sold his soul for power and long life and has him sell his own power to another man in Paris... this man then sells this gift in turn and very quickly the infernal power