Career
Renoir was born in Cagnes-sur-Mer, the only son of Jean Renoir. In 1942 he joined his father in the United States, enlisted in the American Army and served in combat in the Pacific. After the war, he studied English literature and comparative literature and became a professor at the University of California, Berkeley.
He was considered a leading scholar of medieval English literature and published books on Beowulf and John Lydgate.
He had three children, John, Peter and Anne.