Overview
The city of Cambridge is an old British university town and the administrative centre of the county of Cambridgeshire. It lies approximately 50 miles (80 km) north-northeast of London and is surrounded by a number of smaller towns and villages. It is also at the heart of the high-technology centre known as Silicon Fen.

Cambridge is best known for the University of Cambridge, which includes the renowned Cavendish Laboratory, King's College Chapel, and the Cambridge University Library. The Cambridge skyline is dominated by the last two, along with the chimney of Addenbrooke's Hospital in the far south of the city and St John's College Chapel tower in the north.

According to the 2001 census, the City's population was 108,863 (including 22,153 students). However, the population of the urban area, which includes parts of South Cambridgeshire district is estimated to be 130,000.

Drawing on its links with the University, the Cambridge area today is sometimes referred to as Silicon Fen, due to the growth of high tech businesses and technology incubators that have sprung up in the series of science parks and other developments in and around the city. Such companies include CSR, world leader in Bluetooth chips, Acorn Computers and Sinclair. Cambridge was also the home of Pye Limited famous in the last century for early wireless and TV sets. In later years Pye evolved into several other companies including Pye Telecommunications (now Sepura, famous for TETRA radio equipment). Another major business is Marshall Aerospace located on the eastern edge of the city.

The University was joined by the larger part of Anglia Ruskin University, and the educational reputation has led to other bodies (such as the Open University in East Anglia) basing themselves in the city. The University has a large number of museums that are open to the public.

Sport
Cambridge played a unique role in the invention of modern football as the game's first set of rules were drawn up by members of the university in 1848. The Cambridge Rules were first played in Parker's Piece and had a "defining influence on the 1863 Football Association rules."[7]

Cambridge's most successful sports team over recent years is its rugby union club. After three successive promotions they managed to survive their debut season in National Division Two 2006/07. The club's home ground is at West Renault Park on Granchester Road in the south west corner of the city.

The city is home to Cambridge United F.C., who played in the Football League at the Abbey Stadium from 1970 to 2005, when they were relegated to Conference National. When relegation became inevitable the club was placed in administration with substantial debts, but it emerged from administration in time for the 2005-06 season. The city's other football club Cambridge City F.C. play in the Conference South at Milton Road in Chesterton. Satellite town Histon on the northern edge of the city is home to Conference National side Histon FC.

Cambridge Eagles rugby league team play in the National Conference League East Section during the summer months, often drawing on rugby union players keen to continue playing rugby throughout the year.

British American Football League club Cambridgeshire Cats play at Coldham's Common. The season runs from April to August. The team benefits from the experience of US servicemen from the nearby bases, but due to league quotas, the majority of players are British.

Cambridge is also known for its university sporting events against Oxford, especially the rugby union Varsity Match and the Boat Race. These are followed by people across the globe, many of whom have no connection to the institutions themselves. The Cambridge Dampers Club (punting) used to take part in the Scottish Boat Race, winning the event on a number of occasions.

Motorcycle speedway racing took place at the Greyhound Stadium in Newmarket Road in 1939. It is not known if this venue operated in other years. The team raced as Newmarket as the meeetings were organised by the Newmarket Motorcycle Club.

Fiction - Ties to Cambridge
. In the 1950s, the English children's writer Philippa Pearce created a fictionalised version of Cambridge known as "Castleford" (not connected to the real town of the same name in West Yorkshire). It appears in several of her books, most notably Tom's Midnight Garden and Minnow on the Say. The main distinguishing point between "Castleford" and the real Cambridge is that this "Castleford" does not have a university.

. In the Charles Dickens novel Great Expectations Matthew Pocket, the toutor of the protagonist, Pip, was educated in Cambridge

. Tom Sharpe is also a Cambridge-based author who has written fictional accounts of teaching at Cambridge Technical College (now Anglia Ruskin University) and of Cambridge college life. His fictional "Porterhouse College" appears in many of his novels.

. Susanna Gregory wrote a series of novels set in 14th-century Cambridge and featuring a teacher of medicine and sleuth named Matthew Bartholomew.

. Douglas Adams was at one time a resident of Cambridge, and parts of his novel Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency are set in the city. This novel was partially reworked from his unbroadcast Doctor Who serial Shada, which also included scenes in Cambridge. The television serial Shada was filmed in Cambridge, but was never finished due to strike action. The unfinished story was available to buy on video but is not yet available on DVD.

. Sylvia Plath wrote a number of short stories with a Cambridge setting which are published in the collection Johnny Panic and the Bible of Dreams. Plath was a resident of the city when she won a scholarship to the university.

. Dame Rose Macaulay had strong connections to the city, and set part of her novel They Were Defeated in the city during the reign of Charles I.

. A number of novels in C.P.Snow's Strangers and Brothers series (The Masters, The Affair) are set in a Cambridge college (a thinly-veiled Christ's).

. E.M. Forster, who had a lifetime connection with King's College, set the early parts of two of his novels, The Longest Journey and Maurice, at Cambridge University.

. Kate Atkinson used the town as the setting for her book Case Histories.

. Michelle Spring wrote a series of novels about a Cambridge-based private detective, Laura Principal, beginning with Every Breath You Take (1994).

. Rebecca Stott's Ghostwalk (2007) is set in the Cambridge of today and of Sir Isaac Newton's time.

. Robert Harris's "Enigma" was partly set in Cambridge, when the leading character, Thomas Jericho, was sent to Kings College to recover from a nervous break down. Much of the story describes the centre and west of Cambridge in much detail. The story itself was set in the middle of world war two. The rest of the story was set in Bletchley Park.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambridge