If anything, polished up - Tradução em português

Eu não estou conseguindo entender plenamente o significado de "If anything" muito menos de encontrar uma palavra ou expressão de igual valor...
Já li o post sobre tal dúvida, mas ainda sim ela permanceu...
Outra dúvida é sobre a referência "one" marcado em negrito, pela minha interpretação parece se referir a "literatura", porém o contexto me joga para
"os contos do livro"
E por último, mas não menos importante, o significado de polished up seria polir realmente?

Contexto : (Introduction) They were works of low culture—very unlike the stories of valiant knights and holy saints that the rich paid poets to compose in the Middle Ages, or later literature that was judged by the sophistication of its references and allusions. For centuries, fairy tales were usually considered outside the bounds of refined taste. This isn't to say that people weren't interested in them — they certainly were —but fairy tales weren't the sorts of things about which serious people wrote serious, learned essays like this one. If anything, they were raw material to be polished up into works of "real" literature.

Já agradeço pela ajuda!