Courtesy of Rusell Banks NOVELIST RUSSELL BANKS will visit Ithaca College to launch the Ithaca City of Asylum.

Russell Banks, the author of the acclaimed novels “The Sweet Hereafter” and “Affliction,” will be in Ithaca on Sunday to participate in a reading with poet Yi Ping.

The event will begin at 4 p.m. in the Unitarian Universalist Church. The reading marks the official launch of the Ithaca City of Asylum project.

The Beijing-born Yi was an outspoken democracy advocate and critic of the Chinese government. Five years ago Yi was granted political asylum by the United States, and last year he became Ithaca’s first City of Asylum Resident Writer.

Aside from his critically acclaimed body of work, which includes more than a dozen books of fiction, Banks is also the president of the International Parliament of Writers — the group that initiated the City of Asylum project.

“We wanted [Banks] to come and launch us as a project,” said project coordinator Bridget Meeds ’91. “And actually it was another dissident writer who provided the connection — a writer named Bei Dao. He came to visit Yi Ping and said ‘Oh, I was just having lunch with Russell. Why don’t you call him and invite him?’ So we did.”

Meeds makes sure her alma mater participates with the City of Asylum project. Although the details are still to be worked out, it is hoped Yi will come up to South Hill to do readings for the college.

“As an alum I thought Ithaca College should be involved with this project,” she said. “Three people took the lead with that. Harvey Fireside, a retired professor of politics, and Barb Adams, a professor of writing, and Paul Hamill, an administrator, are on our board of advisors.”

Hamill, the college’s director of Academic Funding and Sponsored Programs, said he hopes Sunday’s event is a launching pad for the program.

“Banks is coming to show this community and ... the country that the Cities of Asylum idea is one that ought to spread.”