Born in Westcliff-on-Sea, Charles Wrenn was privately educated, before he was elected to a scholarship at The Queen's College, Oxford, where he achieved First class honours in English.
[9] In 1933, Wrenn delivered a paper on Standard Old English to the Philological Society which was seen as a major corrective to Henry Sweet's idea that West Saxon was standardised.
"In 1954, Wrenn was appointed Vicegerent to act as Master in the absence of Frederick Homes Dudden, becoming the first Professor Fellow to hold a college office.
[2][7][13][3] Wrenn was the founder of the International Association of University Professors of English, organising its first conference at Magdalen College, Oxford in 1950 and serving as its first chairman from 1950 until 1953.
[14][3] He was also a member of the Inklings, an Oxford literary discussion group which included C. S. Lewis and Tolkien, and which met for nearly two decades between the early 1930s and late 1949.