I'm interested in this topic and in the two typical routes you observe: focus on why the book is actually juicy in a popularizable way, or mythologize it as having some special stature among highbrow books. It seems to me that the whole concept of "highbrow" may just do harm to reading, as some people assume they won't be able to understand the book while others read it just to prove they can understand it, i.e., they read it for elitist reasons rather than because it's a good match for them.